How Far Off the Reservation?
by cowgirlfromhell
Summary: How far will Dean Bendis go to save a fellow agent? How far will he go to finish the job? And how far off the reservation? Please heed the MA rating.
1. Chapter 1

Thirty-two year old Dean Bendis was in deep cover. He was also in deep shit. The black ops undercover cop was suddenly and inexplicably up to his ass in it as what was fast becoming his worst nightmare played out right before his eyes.

They'd brought the woman to him, roughed up and bloodied, expecting him to finish the job. He was, after all, Frank Clovis' lieutenant, his enforcer, his hired gun. Judge, jury and executioner all rolled into one neat, well-muscled package. He had killed before at his boss' behest putting a 40-caliber Fang Face squarely between Johnny J's squinty little rat eyes but this was different.

Johnny J, one of Clovis' many minions. Johnny J, who liked to play with matches. Johnny J who, when sent to torch the home of one of Clovis' fiercest rivals, neglected to give the wife and children fair warning before setting the place ablaze. In fact, it was rumored that Johnny had tied the lot of them together and, after dousing them with gasoline, had thrown a lit book of matches at them. In essence he had used mom, pop and the kiddies as the writhing, screaming source of the fire that eventually burned the man's home to the ground.

Franklin Clovis, a moderately handsome, obscenely wealthy drug kingpin, arms dealer masquerading as a well-respected businessman and Mike Killeen's, aka Dean Bendis' employer, had in his own perverse sense of right and wrong applauded Johnny Jerome's initiative in burning his rival to a crisp but drew the line at murdering the man's wife and kids. Business was business but a man's family was not always a part of that business Frank had proclaimed and as a final test of Dean Bendis' loyalty had ordered the overzealous torch's elimination.

Dean had done the job quickly and efficiently and without remorse, simply shooting the maggot with his HK USP Compact then leaving the body on the well-tended lawn of Clovis' estate for someone else to clean up. The fact the little fuck stick had tried to gank him with a shive instead of heeding his warning to leave town...forever...left Bendis with a clear conscious and the world a better place. Yeah, whacking a psycho had been easy but this cluster fuck was a whole 'nother Oprah.

Frank Clovis, his normally placid and pale face red with rage, and Carlo Fiore, a fat fuck of a man with barely visible pig eyes and greasy black hair, had burst into Bendis' quarters in the large guesthouse tucked neatly behind Clovis' mansion on the spacious estate literally dragging someone between them. Although her usually immaculate appearance was now thoroughly disheveled Dean recognized the woman immediately, her once spotless white blouse torn and stained with drops of her own blood. A wet smear under her nose matched the angry red welts that colored and marred her flawless cheeks and Dean wondered immediately where the 'ape', who usually accompanied her when she met with Clovis, was.

Placing the book he had been reading face down in his lap Dean cocked an eyebrow and, although he was seriously concerned about the situation, feigned annoyance at the intrusion and demanded to know why Clovis and Fiore were standing in his 'home' with the poor unfortunate woman wavering unsteadily between them.

His stomach sank when Fiore, between sucking great gasps of air into his lungs, his hurried march across the lawn taking its toll, said, "This bitch ain't who she says. She's DEA. "

Disrespecting both men by staying seated and further dismissing Fiore out of hand Dean turned his head to look up at Clovis expectedly.

"Special Agent Erin Scott," Clovis added, her real name and title dripping from his tongue distastefully as if they left a bad taste in his mouth.

Dean's stomach proceeded to tie itself into knots as his gaze turned directly to the woman he knew only as Sarah Miles. Sarah Miles, a high roller in the long, protracted, high stakes bidding war which Clovis had instigated, was a stunning woman with platinum blonde hair cut in a severe yet flattering elongated bob. She had steely blue-gray eyes and seemed to have ice water in her veins.

Purported to be from St. Louis she had come with a half dozen others into LAPD's backyard, as it were, to vie for the huge cache of drugs and weapons Clovis had placed on the block two weeks before. When the dust had settled she was one of only two buyers left standing and, up until a few moments ago, Dean would have bet that she had been the front-runner, in direct competition with his boss, Carter Shaw, as they went head to head vying for the Holy Grail of contraband.

Although Dean suspected that the lone female in the group had used her brain as well as her feminine wiles to achieve her objective, to buy the lot out from under Carter, he hadn't been overly concerned. If she had prevailed, by whatever means, he, Carter and the others would have simply stepped in and arrested her right along with Clovis and Fiore but things had now taken a nasty turn no one had expected, a turn for the worse.

If it was true and Sarah Miles was, in fact, a federal agent no one from her agency had bothered to notify LAPD of DEA's obvious interest in Clovis. If they had Captain Maynard would have told them, in no uncertain terms, that his men, Dean Bendis in particular, had been inside and privy to almost every aspect of Clovis' operation for roughly three months and to back the fuck off.

Eleven weeks, six days and twenty-six minutes to be exact for Dean. Time well spent, first getting close enough to Clovis to catch his attention, then toadying to him, doing whatever it took to impress him and to gain his confidence including killing a man.

SOP precluded the two agencies from interacting and to Dean's knowledge nothing outside of a couple of busted surveillance ops had ever happened before, certainly nothing of this magnitude.

"One of Carlo's men recognized her and picked her up before she could hook up with that other asshole. My guess is that he's DEA, too, so I need you to go after as soon as you finish with her."

Dean listened to Clovis with half an ear as his mind went in a million different directions. He tried to figure out what he needed to do next, his churning emotions masked by his poker face, as different scenarios quickly played out in his mind. Simply doing as Clovis asked even crossed his mind at one point but executing the woman wasn't an option...yet...and he shoved that idea deep down into his last resort box. He then opened up his twisted, sick fuck box and selected an idea that was pretty horrific but one that might buy them some time.

"Looks like Smith wins by default," Clovis announced and Dean looked up at him, his eyes staring coldly, as if he really didn't give a shit. Clovis swallowed and continued. "I'll tell him in the morning but, in the mean time, get rid of this garbage," he said and shoved the woman forward forcefully.

Dean stood up slowly and, with his head back and slightly cocked belying his 5' 11" stature, discarded the book in the chair and silently appraised her. When Clovis spoke up again she started and turn away from Dean's icy stare.

"You're not adverse to killing a woman are you Killeen?" Clovis wanted to know.

A quiet laugh escaped the undercover cop. "Nope, not at all. Only this one is…special." Circling the DEA agent smoothly and silently like a cat she jumped a second time when his finger touched the nape of her neck and, although it was quite warm in the bungalow, a shiver ran the length of her body.

"You want her? She's yours," Clovis offered magnanimously with a humorless and insincere laugh.

Fiore opened his thick-lipped mouth to protest and Dean knew he had to stake his claim on her right then and there. "She was mine from the first moment I saw her," he said icily, no mistake what so ever in his insistence and intent.

At the sound of his quiet and deadly voice Erin Scott's heart began to beat even more wildly and her breath came in ragged pants that she tried valiantly to control her fear but to no avail.

Dean heard her and, looking into her eyes, wished he could allay the fear he saw there in but knew that for her sake and for his, too, he couldn't divulge his true identity until the op was over... if even then. Right now he needed to subjugate her quickly and wrapping his hand tightly around her throat he backed her up against the arm of the upholstered chain in which he'd been sitting.

One could hear a pin drop in the room as he hiked up her skirt, his face mere inches from hers, and pulled on the silken material hidden beneath. Her panties tore like melting butter in his strong grip and the DEA agent just stared at him, her blue eyes clouded, her mind numbed by the savage treatment she'd received at the hands of Clovis and Fiore after events had quickly spiraled out of control.

With one hand wrapped around her slender neck, Dean unfastened his belt with the other and pushed his David Lance slacks down over well-muscled thighs. Oblivious to the bug eyed stares and rasping breath of both Clovis and Fiore as they watched what was unfolding before them. Dean leaned in and whispered into her ear, "It's either me or Fiore or Clovis...maybe both."

Her eyes widening with understanding a faintly whispered "No" was all Dean heard before he turned her away from him. With a look of disgust on his face he bent her over the chair's well-padded arm.

Let them think he couldn't bear the sight of her battered face when what he really couldn't bear to see, why he had turned her away, was the look in her eyes as he raped her in the richly appointed living room of Clovis' guest house, staking a tenuous claim on her in what was a vile and most likely futile attempt to keep her alive.

It was quick and brutal and, even though her face had been turned away, if he allowed it the quiet pleading 'no' would echo in his mind for a very long time.

Pulling out of her Dean hiked up and refastened his slacks. He swallowed hard to keep down the bile that threatened to erupt and spew out, the way his hatred and anger wanted to wash lethally over the two men who stood smiling, clearly aroused by what had just taken place.

Fiore took a step toward the woman and Dean stopped him with a hand on a beefy arm and both he and Clovis strained to catch his next words. The quiet iciness with which they were delivered left no doubt as to the hired killer's desires. "Until the moment I kill her…she's mine."

Looking into Bendis' face and seeing green eyes like ice staring back at him, the threat unmistakable, Clovis cleared his throat and ran his hand nervously across his chin. "Just make sure she doesn't leave here alive," he said lamely, again not really sure who was really in charge, him or the taciturn Killeen.

A brittle laugh escaped Bendis' tight jaw between gritted teeth, the sound of it unnerving, as the two men left the room, one after the other, without further comment.

Once outside Clovis shook his head. The psycho son of a bitch could have her; fuck her 'till the cows came home then practice necrophilia after he killed her for all he cared. The broad was good looking Clovis acceded. Probably the only reasons she'd gotten as close to him as she had. But being good looking wasn't enough to keep her from being recognized and it sure wasn't enough to keep her alive.

"You outta get rid of 'im, too. He's crazy. I can see it in his eyes," Fiore recommended once they were out of Bendis' hearing. Just being in the same room with Killeen put the fat man on edge, gave him the creeps if he was honest about it.

He had hated Clovis' man from the moment he'd first met him and the assault he had just witnessed only reinforced his opinion of the whipcord thin, dark haired man. "He's spooky if you ask me," Fiore continued, "Stares at you like a goddamned retard."

"I thought of it," Clovis admitted and wondered if he could ever get close enough to Killeen now without getting bitten, "But he's too good at what he does."

When word had come down to Clovis that there might be a Fed stinking up the works he had immediately thought it was Mike Killeen so he had ordered him to take care of Johnny J. The taciturn killer had executed the poor schmuck without a backward glance. Clovis figured that if he were truly a Fed there was no way he could have pulled the trigger but, if he were a bona fide sociopath, pulling the trigger would have been child's play.

The reasons he had promoted Killeen to the position of his lieutenant was because he was ruthless and maybe a little crazy and now he expected the same results with regard to Miles or whoever the hell she was and if the crazy bastard wanted to play with her for a while before killing her so be it.

Entering his home Clovis locked the solid back door firmly behind him. He felt a little more at ease with some distance and a secure lock between himself and Mike Killeen and he was satisfied that the bitch would soon be just a distant memory.

Erin Scott, aka Sarah Miles, was tough and smart and had played hardball throughout the negotiations but now Dean needed to force her to play his game, his way. If she worked against him one of them, or maybe both, would end up dead.

After the assault Erin remained standing her eyes no longer confused but hard, dark with anger and murderous in their intent. The realization of the futility of her circumstances pumped her full of adrenalin-fueled bravado as she realized she was now caught in an interminable situation with apparently neither recourse nor avenue of escape. Her stance became defiant and she lifted her chin ready to take on her assailant against all odds and Dean immediately saw it in her eyes.

She had nothing to lose and he could almost hear her thoughts as she came to the same conclusion and closing the gap between them in a fraction of a second he backhanded her viciously and sent her crashing into a small table. Grabbing her wrist painfully he pulled her up and propelled her into the bedroom where he shoved her hard. She fell in a heap on the bed where she lay, her head spinning, her ears ringing while Dean ripped open his closet door. He grabbed a handful of expensive Dior Homme neckties and began securing her limbs to the four posters of the bed.

Regaining her senses Erin Scott fought back. Kicking and scratching, grunts punctuating every move she made, she tried to disable him and struggled valiantly up until he hit her in the jaw. She now lay unconscious, stripped naked and tied securely to the bed.

Stepping back Dean assessed his injuries touching his cheek gingerly. She'd gotten in a few well-placed kicks and a trio of deep scratched that stung ferociously marred his handsome face but, for the moment, she was restrained and safe. Now he had to make her partner disappear.


	2. Chapter 2

Carter Shaw, also know as Mr. Avery Smith, Esquire, of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, picked at an imagined piece of lint on his immaculate Armani suit jacket as he stood waiting patiently for the arrival of the arms dealer and his lieutenant.

Clovis, looking as elegantly professional as ever, walked through the doors and into the conference room, a predatory smile on his lips. "Mr. Smith," he greeted the dark haired man shaking Carter's outstretched hand.

Carter smiled and had to make a conscious effort not to take out his breast pocket handkerchief and wipe off the man's touch. Clovis indicated the seat Ms Miles usually occupied at the large cherry wood conference table and, gently tugging his pant legs, Carter took the proffered seat directly opposite the drug dealer.

"Mizz Miles…?" he questioned, his southern accent thick and spot on.

"Won't be joining us," Clovis finished as Dean, dressed down in a pullover and dress slacks, walked through the door and settled into the chair next to his employer, his eyes momentarily pinning Carter to his seat.

A barely discernible shake of Bendis' head alerted the other operative to expect something out of the ordinary. There had been some sort of change and Carter had better be ready.

Smiling his most insincere smile he spoke to Clovis, "Nothing serious, I hope. I do enjoy sparring with a woman who is smart as well as easy on the eyes."

Bendis' hand automatically moved to his face and his fingertips feathered over the deep gouges in a futile attempt to sooth the pain. Carter watched surreptitiously, his face remaining passive, and he wondered what in the hell had transpired since their last meeting two days earlier.

Interest in the buy had been keen and Clovis' paranoia monumental and the negotiations had dragged out for a good two weeks. Two weeks of vetting Carter as well as the others. Two weeks of keeping tabs on their offshore accounts to find out who was still in the running when the bids hit the fan. For Carter it had been two weeks of being watched, his every move monitored, his every phone call listened to, his every trip to the bathroom more than likely carefully logged.

Carter Shaw had been under for a little over two weeks most of his time spent cooling his heels in a luxury hotel and, while Dean's digs were nothing if not tasteful bordering on opulent, the younger cop had spent almost three months deep in the shit filled bowels of Clovis' empire and rumors concerning his UC abounded. His eyes flicked to Dean but the younger man's gaze remained downcast, his brow furrowed in thought. Reticent on a good day Dean was now as quiet as death.

"It seems that Ms Miles is, or should I say was," Clovis paused and lifted his eyes to scrutinize Carter's reaction, "in the employ of the Federal Government."

The turn of events took Carter completely by surprise but his poker face held him in good stead. He merely cocked an eyebrow and chuckled, "You don't say?"

Leaning back in his chair Carter's first reaction was anger aimed directly at the DEA bureaucrats who had sent Miles into harms way without checking first to see if her office was prime on the operation. His second reaction was disgust. The good guys had been working against one another all along dragging the negotiations out far longer than had ever been necessary, using up precious resources, tying up agents and burning man-hours.

The woman was good at her job though and had fooled him right along with Clovis. She knew her assault rifles like Clark Hodges and her pharmaceuticals like a chemist and apparently she emitted enough pheromones wrapped in her expensive perfume to keep Clovis panting like a dog following a bitch in heat. Even Carter himself had been interested but she seemed to only have her eyes on the prize and he understood why now. Just as taking drugs was never sanctioned when undercover, sleeping with the scum of the earth, no matter how well appointed, was also not in the job description.

Clovis spoke again and Carter smiled solicitously. "Yeah, my man Killeen here is keeping her on ice until he grows weary of the tiresome bitch after which he'll take whatever steps are necessary." Clovis turned to Bendis whose cold smile put him in mind of a wolf thinking about a helpless sheep.

"I do like a woman with a certain amount of fight in her," Dean replied quietly and rubbed the scratches again, his eyes now looking toward but not meeting those of his superior.

Shaw's thoughts continued to race. Bendis had somehow managed to take charge of the outed agent but, judging by the scratches, it had not been an easy job. Once he was finally able to capture Dean's gaze Carter was shocked to find no trace of Dean Bendis staring back at him. It was as if his inside man had indeed become Mike Killeen and Carter was suddenly afraid for the man sitting across from him and for the woman under his protection.

"Perhaps Mr. Killeen…" he started to say.

"No!" Dean spat out.

Whatever it was Carter was about to suggest Dean wanted no part of it. To surrender her now to anyone could mean her death and if he wasn't careful quite possibly his own. She would stay with him until the op was over.

Clovis laughed and slapped his man soundly on the back. "From what I've seen, Mikey here has formed a certain attachment to our friend from DEA," the crime boss said laughing coarsely, "But if he isn't careful he just might break his pretty new toy."

Pointedly ignoring Clovis' remark Carter leaned forward staring intently at the young agent but Bendis' eyes still danced around his and Carter wondered what Clovis was alluding to. Just what had Dean done to garner the wicked scratches on his face?

Growing more and more concerned as the weeks passed into months and Dean Bendis embraced the persona of the killer Killeen more intimately; Carter Shaw began to toy with the idea that there could be a problem with Dean's continued isolation until Dean himself had simply reminded him of one of the rules they lived or died by. Once you were in there was no out until the bust went down.

Carter Shaw knew the feelings of isolation and the loss of one's true identity well as he had nearly lost himself dozens of time in deep cover and Dean Bendis had been living, eating and breathing Mike Killeen for three long months. Now that the end was in sight it was imperative that the young undercover agent 'maintain an even strain' so they could bring the op to a successful conclusion and finally bring him in from the cold.


	3. Chapter 3

Alone in the guest house Erin Scott told herself she would do anything, anything Killeen wanted if it kept her alive. In the hours she had lain, tied spread eagle to the bed, she had made mental lists; lists of accomplishments, lists of failures, lists of things still to be done and, when she was finished, the most pitiful of those lists was the list of what might have been. A list of the things she had placed on hold before realizing just how very short her life was to actually be.

On that list were the things most little girls dream of and most grown women, even as the years slip by, never really give up on, to someday be a wife and mother.

Thinking there would be more than enough time Erin had concentrated on her career while patiently waiting for Mr. Right. He had never come along but her career had flourished and after four years of college and ten years with the agency, the last seven as an undercover agent, she was a highly trained and well-respected field agent. But now, as she languished on the bed, she knew now that it simply wasn't enough and her life would most likely end in a city far from her home, in a lavish but sterile guesthouse, terrorized and brutalized and finally murdered by the sociopath who now held her captive.

Oh, she had known what she was in for when she had sworn her oath but still a heartfelt sigh escaped her lips as she closed her eyes and imagined her own gravestone. Not 'Erin Scott - beloved wife and mother" but "Erin Scott - a good cop". Still, she didn't regret the years of blood, sweat and tears that had gone into reaching her goals within the department. What she did resent was the fact that being a DEA agent was to be the only thing that defined her and the contributing factor to her death.

She was proud to be a part of such an elite group of crime fighters ridding the streets of illegal narcotics but, at that particular moment, she resented being asked to go above and beyond the call of duty; so far beyond that it took her right up to the gates of hell where Satan's minion, Mike Killeen, waited to escort her through.

Clovis' lieutenant was a handsome man that she had surreptitiously watched from time to time as she sat across the table from him trying to broker a deal with his slime ball of a boss. Closely cropped brown hair and devastating green eyes that, in their intensity and utter coldness, could actually send a chill through her and, as she remembered the way he had looked at her, goose bumps covered her naked body and her nipples peaked painfully.

"Thinkin' about me?"

Erin's eyes flew open and her heart turned painfully in her chest knocking the breath out of her. Kileen stood next to the bed, his entry into the house and footfalls up to her absolutely silent. Adrenalin shot through her body bringing her to near panic and she pulled at the make-shift restraints tightening them even further around her slender neck and her already numb hands and feet.

Dean watched as she bucked up and found himself becoming aroused/ He sat down next to her on the bed slowly unbuttoning his shirt.

Understanding his intent fully Erin was about to scream but remembered her unspoken bargain with the devil, to do anything he wanted in the hopes of staying alive, and she settled back and waited for the next act in their obscene play.

She didn't have long to wait when he began unfastening his pants and told her, "That's better," in a quiet, calm voice so devoid of any warmth that it chilled her to the bone. As his eyes stared into hers he smiled and added, "I took care of your partner."

In her abject misery Erin had forgotten all about her fellow agent, her partner, and she cried out and would have traded her immortal soul right then and there for a gun when Dean added with a laugh, "Your boss is gonna be pretty short handed for awhile."

"You fucking bastard," she growled trying again to break free or to kill herself as the restraint around her neck bit into her until spots danced before her eyes.

Dean leaned in and placed both hands on either side of her face and forced her head back down into the pillow. Holding her firmly he waited patiently until she stopped struggling and grew quiet, still panting, breasts heaving against his bare chest. Letting her go he loosened the bond around her neck and brought his face close, his lips hesitating over hers.

His captive licked dry lips and shut her eyes willing herself to be calm, Dean supposed, but he could see the vain in her neck throb as blood hammered within and he could feel the rapid beating of her heart. Trailing his hand lazily down her face to cup her cheek he softly rubbed the pad of his thumb over her parted lips.

Erin let him slide it easily into her mouth and bit down hard, drawing blood. Pain seared through his hand and up his arm but he remained still, never uttering a sound or making a move to pull free as her teeth sliced into tender flesh. Getting no reaction to her attack Erin released her hold on the digit just short of biting through to the bone.

Dean dragged it, bleeding, back across her lips and down between her breasts leaving a trail of crimson and tasted his own blood when he crushed her lips painfully with his. With his wounded hand guiding him, he entered her, silently this time, no sound at all punctuating his violent thrusts, only Erin's sharply inhaled breath each time he drove into her.

Bendis came with a trembling shutter and he lay heavily on her for long moments. When he was finally able to lift his head a combination of saliva and blood flew into his face. He should have expected as much and with a short sardonic laugh he rose up off of her and walked from the bed letting the spittle drip slowly down his cheek. He left the room, light shining off his sweat slick back and buttocks.

In the bathroom, well out of sight but not out of earshot, Dean leaned against the wall, shoulders slumped as he pressed his forehead to the cool plaster. As he listened to her curse him and cry, a myriad of unnerving feelings washed over him yet again. He had felt it for the past few weeks, the uncertainty, the confusion. He'd been under for much longer periods of time and, if one counted the day he been forced to leave his rich and privileged life behind for the academy and riding the underbelly of the snake, he'd been "under" for almost sixteen years.

Something was different this time and if Carter had come to him yet again grabbing his arm in his vice-like grip demanding to know if he was okay he would have to flat out lie to him...again. Dean felt as if he were well and truly going out of his fucking mind and his taking of the woman tied to the bed only seemed to confirm it. He wasn't an animal but had proven just the opposite not minutes before. Maybe he wasn't playing at being the bad ass any longer. Maybe he really had become the monster everyone in Clovis' organization thought him to be. Maybe he had never really been playing a part at all.

His thoughts turned back to Erin Scott and he became hard once again. Thoroughly convinced he was some kind of twisted, perverted fuck the thought of the icy beauty staked out on his bed nonetheless sent tendrils of pleasure throughout his body. "Jesus Bendis, she's a fellow agent," he thought then quickly justified his actions, "and I'm trying to save her life."

Running his hand across the stubble of his hair he sighed. He couldn't tell her, couldn't back down now that he had set the tone of their "relationship", the tempo of their lewd dance. He had to make her solely dependent on him for everything, protection from the others in the compound, for the food she ate, for the very air she breathed. As far as she knew she was alone now, her partner murdered and the cavalry nowhere in sight. She needed to know that he would deal with her harshly and brutally if she tried to be a hero. All the factors were coming together to render her powerless, the perfect victim of Stockholm Syndrome.

Reentering the bedroom he saw her shrink away from him as he made his way to the dresser to pull out clean underwear and socks. He then selected a pair of charcoal gray slacks from his closet along with a soft green polo shirt and returned to the bathroom. Setting the clothes down he moved to the sink and turned the faucet's handle and watched as the water swirled down the drain. Looking up he caught a glimpse of himself in the large mirror, a glimpse of what was left of him, eyes sunken and darkly circled, his body hard muscled but too thin from the drugs.

Everyone had expected a vice and he had chosen the one most readily available to him, cocaine. Clovis kept the white powder flowing through the state smoothly with enough of the fallout finding its way into Dean Bendis' hands to keep ten men amped. Fighting it at first he had quickly come to embrace it. He loved the feeling of power, of omnipotence, and every time he laid out a line, whether in Clovis' presence for show or alone with no one to see, he told himself it was all part of the job. It was all part of the job, like keeping a woman tied to his bed and fucking her whenever the urge struck. All part of the job.

What man hadn't fantasized about having a virtual sex slave to use whenever the mood struck? The coked up killer Mike Killeen, definitely, but the upstanding Dean Bendis? Was he still just doing his job or had he crossed the line into the twilight zone of deep cover, he wondered, and suddenly he realized that he no longer knew where Dean Bendis ended and where Mike Killeen began. Tears of frustration sparkled in his eyes and a rage so powerful and blinding came over him that, the next thing he knew, he was extricating his bleeding fist from the plaster wall, the moments before completely blank.

"God Damn!" he cursed under his breath hopelessly trying to wiggle his fingers. His shower would have to wait as he clumsily dressed himself using only his right hand. Walking quickly through the bedroom he didn't give Erin Scott a second glance as he grabbed the keys to his silver-gray Saleen S7 and left, slamming the door behind him.


	4. Chapter 4

Dean Bendis turned off the 110 onto Wilshire Boulevard and headed toward Good Samaritan Hospital. He stopped short at one of the nondescript red brick buildings that lined the streets around of the facility. Turning off the Saleen's powerful 550hp, V8 engine he rubbed his hand across his burning eyes and opened the center console. Pulling out a small glass vile he opened the lid and tapped a good measure of the white powder onto the top of his hand. Just one hit for the pain...and another for the headache building behind his eyes...and a third because it was getting harder and harder for him to find nirvana.

After a few minutes he noticed the ache in his hand had lessened substantially and, holding the injured appendage in front of his face, he looked at the dark bruises mottling his knuckles beneath the shredded skin, the smile on his face almost feral. Blood had dripped down both sides of his hand leaving a bloody trail down the smooth steering wheel of the car.

Dean would miss the Saleen when he returned to the real world where luxury cars and unlimited vials of cocaine had no place, not to mention the clothes and the special treatment afforded one of Franklin Clovis' closest and most feared associates. When he was younger he had briefly had a fire engine red Saleen when he thought he could reconcile a life of affluence and privilege with that of a cop barely making minimum wage.

Dean's father had made it easy for him to come to terms with his dilemma when he'd disowned him but before he could return the car to his father he'd run it into a concrete abutment. Not hard enough to kill himself, only break his nose, but with enough impact to total his father's baby.

Pulling the Compact from the holster hidden beneath his $1450.00 Dolce and Gabbana leather jacket Dean clicked off the safely. He exited the car and spun around knocking Ty Curtis to the ground. Thumbing back the hammer of the gun he squatted in the mostly deserted street and held the muzzle under his stunned co-worker's chin for a good thirty seconds before releasing it. Standing, Dean holstered the piece and extended his hand to the fallen man who in turn slapped it away.

"Christ, Bendis, what was that all about?" Ty growled angrily.

Stepping up onto the sidewalk Dean waited for his partner to get up, dust himself off and straighten his clothes as the street light above him winked on illuminating the area in the rosy haze of metal halide.

Limping slightly Ty joined him on the sidewalk.

"You do know you could have compromised me?" Dean said rhetorically his words impatient, angry,

"Keep snorting that shit, partner, and it's just a matter of time before you compromise yourself."

"Did you follow me just to nursemaid me?" Dean wanted to know.

"I followed you to find out what the hell's going on," Ty told him taking in the scratches on his face and his shattered hand, "What the fuck's happening to you?"

Lifting his hand so Ty could get the full effect, Dean simply said, "Had an accident."

"You seem kinda accident prone lately, man,." Ty said and raised his hand toward the ugly scratches marring Bendis' pretty face.

Jerking his head away Dean took a step back, his eyes glaring, his jaw working furiously in a coked up frenzy and in no mood for small talk, or any talk at all for that matter, demanded, "Tell me about Scott's partner."

"He's safe and sound," Ty started and Dean turned to go, "but we can't sit on him forever. DEA'll want _all_ their agents back...and soon."

Turning back Dean assured him, "I'll bring her in with me as soon as this is over."

"Carter was gonna ask your boss for her. He said he thought he would have let her go as a gesture of good faith," Ty then said and his words pissed Dean off even further.

Carter was Dean's boss not Clovis as the black man had just alluded to and despite his anger he remained outwardly calm. He hadn't known what Clovis would or wouldn't do but he just couldn't take the chance. "Maybe," Dean said coldly then stepped back as Ty again tried to move closer.

The black undercover cop realized his barb had hit home. "What the fuck, Dean?" Ty said testily noting the tremor in Dean's hand as his partner ran it down his face in frustration, "I know it's been a long haul but it's almost over. You just need to keep it together a little while longer, brother."

"This might end…but it's never gonna to be over," Dean said cryptically then turned and walked down the alleyway between two of the buildings and, as Ty watched, he entered one through a side door and was simply gone.

"Son of a bitch," Ty ground out in frustration as he headed back to his car to call Shaw.

"We need to wrap this up, Carter," Ty said anxiously pacing back and forth in front of Carter's hotel. He was dressed as a homeless man and had been pacing and ranting for the better part of half an hour as he waited for Carter to come outside.

"You want to tell me why?" Carter asked in a voice only Ty could hear as he passed him by.

No! No way would he tell Carter that Dean had most likely rounded the bend. They simply needed to bring him in. He and Jamie would take care of "things" after that, the two of them doing whatever was needed to bring him back full circle. "I been under too long", he said instead, "I hate dressing up in these crappy, bug infested old clothes. Campin' out on the streets."

Although he had no doubt Ty Curtis could skew the results of any lie detector test he took if he put his mind to it, Carter knew it was a lie. It was Dean Bendis who had been under too long.

Communications with Dean had been spotty at best but in recent days had ceased altogether. The only information gleaned was from his meetings with Clovis. There was plenty of talk on the streets, though, talk of drugs and murder and an undercover cop gone sideways. "Did you take care of Scott's partner?" Carter spoke into his cell phone as Ty passed him by again.

"Oh, I took care of him alright," Ty shouted, clenched fist pumping the air. A group of tourists turned their heads and some laughed nervously at what they thought was a hallucinating drunk fighting with his invisible demons. Turning on them Ty held out his hand and asked for money and the group hurried down the sidewalk. "He wants to know if she'll be safe with Dean," Ty mumbled holding out his hand to Carter.

Pulling a dollar from his jacket pocket and handing it to the bum standing before him Carter nodded hesitantly because, in truth, he didn't really know.


	5. Chapter 5

Alone in Carter Shaw's cavernous war room Jamie Allen sat at a computer terminal making sure Carter's bank accounts in the Caymans showed enough funds to complete the transaction with Franklin Clovis. Relegated to technical support she also had on the audio feeds from him, Ty and from Dean whenever the latter bothered to check in.

Restless, she'd dressed, made a lame excuse to Scott about needing to check something at the office and headed downtown where she'd spent the last hour going over the few minutes of video Carter had surreptitiously taken of Dean during their last meeting. She thought he looked terrible and wondered if he was sick...or worse.

"Hey, Jamie."

She could smell him before she could see him and Ty came sauntering up to her still dressed as a homeless man, a bottle of cheap wine wrapped in a brown paper bag in his hand.

"You here for a hot shower? If you are, don't get undressed," she said fanning the air in front of her face.

Ty parked a butt cheek on her desk and said, "Sorry," then added, "You do know this is just "Ass in a Bottle" cologne and not really me, don't you?"

"Yeah, sure," she said with a laugh pushing back from her desk.

"Couldn't sleep?" he asked.

"Nope," she replied.

"Kinda like our boy here," Ty said pointing to the screen where Carter's video of Dean ran in a continuous loop.

"Did you make contact?" Jamie asked trying to keep any hint of anxiety from her voice.

Something had gone down between Jamie Allen and Dean Bendis shortly after Carter had recruited her and Ty guessed that whatever 'it' had been had run hot and heavy...for a short while at least. "Oh yeah, the son of a bitch knocked me down and shoved a gun in my face."

Jamie glanced sideways at him and when he didn't smile at what should have been a stupid joke she knew Dean really had pulled his gun on Ty and that the black man was royally pissed. If concern didn't carry through to her voice it most certainly showed in her eyes and furrowed brow and Ty was relatively sure he could trust her. "He's using..." he blurted out. Ty was going to say "again" but he didn't trust her that much...yet.

This time Jamie couldn't keep the concern from her eyes or her voice when she asked, "God, what's he using?"

"Only the highest grade Connie for Dean Bendis."

"Insufflation?" Jamie asked to his surprise and he gave her a look and a nod. Lowering her eyes she told him, "I know all about it. Old boyfriend...back in the day."

"Listen, Carter suspects but doesn't know for sure and if Dean doesn't start hemorrhaging right in front of him can you help me get him clean?"

Detoxification was a short but very painful process and she didn't want to see Dean have to go through it but she didn't want him to get canned either. His job was all he seemed to have going for him at this point in his life and he was good at it. "Detox is one thing but keeping him from giving into the cravings to make the pain stop is the real challenge."

"We'll just keep him busy; run his skinny white ass ragged so he doesn't have time to think about it."

"Sounds like a plan but where are we gonna put him? It'll be at least three days minimum," Jamie said knowing full well that Scott would never understand if she brought home a coked up cop, one that she'd fucked.

"It'll have to be his place. You know where it is?"

Ty watched her blush and not answer his question, only change the subject. "We'll need a few things. Fluids to keep him hydrated, straps to tie him down. I hope puke doesn't bother you."

Pinching the tattered front of his sweatshirt Ty pulled it out and said, "If I can live in this for weeks at a time a little white bread vomit ain't gonna bother me," and Jamie smiled.

dbdbdbdbdb

The cast on Dean's hand and wrist had already started to bother him, the skin beneath it itching maddeningly. Hoping to alleviate much of the discomfort he snorted another two hits off of it while parked in the stone driveway of Clovis' home. The take out food in the back seat was from one of the finest restaurants in L.A. and Dean's stomach growled audibly. He couldn't remember the last time he had eaten but food was fast becoming the last thing on his mind as he headed up the graveled path, rocks crunching beneath his high priced Gucci's.

The undercover cop had begun to ghost walk through his existence like a specter, his dick constantly hard, his mind never far from the thought of Erin Scott tucked safely away in his quarters, his to use whenever and however he wanted, the smell of her fear as intoxicating as any perfume. Stepping onto the porch of the bungalow he noticed the front door was slightly ajar and quietly set the dinner bags down.

He drew the Custom and glued himself to the left of the door and, taking a deep breath, pushing it open with his toe. Ducking inside he listened intently as a muffled voice came from the bedroom and heading soundlessly across the thick Aubusson carpet he smelled Fiore's cloying aftershave. Beneath that nauseating odor he could smell Agent Scott's fear, a distinct scent he was well used to.

Inside the bedroom the fat man knelt precariously on the side of the bed hovering over the naked woman. Her face was pale, her lips tinged blue as she suffered the first stages of asphyxia, the tie around her neck practically embedded into her flesh as she tried to pull further away from Fiore. Dean figured correctly that she would rather strangle than have the loathsome tub of lard touch her.

Spotting him she rasped out, "Killeen!"

Fiore blanched and turned his head until he felt the cold barrel of a gun dig into his jowl and heard Dean say, "I said she was mine."

The iciness of Dean's curt reminder cut through Fiore like a knife, his bowels threatening to let loose. "Now wait a minute, Killeen," the porker said. He began to posture and bluster until the cast on Bendis' hand landed with a fierce blow across his face shredding lips and loosening teeth.

Wielding the cast like a club Dean hit Fiore a second time and sent him flying off the bed and onto his back blood pouring from his mouth and nose threatening to drown him. Squatting beside him Dean pressed the muzzle of his gun painfully against the man's temple and tears sprang to his victim's eyes.

"I didn't touch the bitch!"

It was a bubbling, blood-frothed cry and it was a lie. Filled with disgust at the man's blubbering Dean rose up and laid his sidearm on the dresser then crossed over to the bed. He sat down and picked up the private line to Clovis' residence. "Get someone over here now!" he shouted angrily into the receiver and slammed it down.

Within minutes two of Clovis' men and Clovis himself stood in the doorway of the bedroom. "Jesus Christ, Killeen," the first man swore kneeling next to the bleeding man.

The second man retrieved a towel from the bathroom staring at the bound agent as he passed by the bed and asked when he returned, "You tryin' to kill 'im, Mikey?"

"Just get him out of here," Dean replied, his good hand absently caressing Erin's thigh.

Pulling Fiore into a sitting position the second man pressed the towel to the incoherent man's face, the slight pressure of the towel eliciting loud moans.

"He needs a doctor," Clovis said to no one in particular mentally rethinking his relationship with the thin, almost gaunt man sitting calmly on the bed, his hand resting possessively on the woman's leg, the bloodied cast resting in his lap.

An adrenalin dump caused Erin's body to begin to shake as she struggled for air and tears slipped from her closed eyes and she silently begged, "Please don't let me die like this," and, as if he had heard her, Dean looked down and immediately produced a knife. Erin's heart skipped a beat as she felt the iciness of the blade against her throat. This was it. She was sure Killeen was going to follow through on his orders from Fiore and his unspoken threat to kill her but, instead of choking on her own blood, the silken noose around her throat was gone and she sucked the fetid air of her prison greedily into her lungs.

Her throat burned and she swallowed painfully then, turning her head on her stiff and bruised neck, she watched as the two men dragged Fiore to his feet and practically carried him out of the room, Clovis following closely behind them.

"If I see him again…I will kill him."

Turning back to Dean, Clovis stared into the speaker's face and was amazed to see eyes so dead in a living being and, although Michael Killeen was exactly who he had wanted him to be, a stone cold killer, he could only think of his mother's warning before walking out of the room. "Be careful what you wish for".

When the room was finally empty and quiet Dean leaned forward, his arms across his thighs and hung his head. He was beyond tired. His hand throbbed as he lifted and examined the bloody cast and a bitch of a headache had finally taken hold.

"Please."

He heard the whispered pitiful plea and stood up, turned and watched as the undercover DEA agent tried in vain to ease the cramping of her muscles all the while tears slipped freely from beneath her lashes. With the knife still in his hand he quickly sliced through the remaining ties that bound her and she slowly rolled away from him and curled up into a fetal position.

Shrugging off his jacket and shoulder holster he placed them next to his gun on the dresser and lay down on the bed beside her. He touched her tangled of hair and knew she would probably be grateful for a bath but first he needed to sleep. With his bad hand resting above his head on a pillow he wrapped his good arm around her waist and, ignoring her sharp intake of breath when he touched her, pulled her into his body and buried his face in her hair.

After a few minutes his breathing became even and his body relaxed into hers, his softening erection pressed firmly against her rear end. Erin felt his warm breath on her hair and the strangely comforting weight of his arm holding her and her tear-swollen eyes closed slowly as she moved closer into his warmth. As long as he was here with her she was safe from the others. As long as he was asleep she was safe from him.

When she awoke again the next morning...he was gone.


	6. Chapter 6

Erin tried the bedroom door and found it locked from the outside. Really, where would she go if it did open? The estate was heavily guarded and she looked like some bizarre, naked clown with the remnants of the neckties around her wrists and ankles. Her bladder was near bursting and she retreated to the bathroom, locked the door and laughed, a little maniacally, because a flimsy locked door couldn't keep out the boogieman. After relieving herself she approached the sink and saw the fist sized hole in the wall next to it. Plaster pieces had collapsed in on it and she just stopped and stared for a few moments at the evidence of total, uncontrolled rage. Next she made her way to the large shower and turned the faucets to full blast and as hot as she thought she could stand it.

She began to untie the bindings on her wrists and ankles and caught sight of herself in the decadent mirrored wall and, frozen by the visage that stared back, she stopped dead. Dark ugly bruises marred her fair skin and dried blood cracked at the corners of her mouth when she opened it wide to inspect the damage inside. She snorted. A little makeup, the hairdresser to the dead and she would look good as new lying in her coffin.

As she continued to stare tears suddenly filled her eyes, unbidden and unwelcome, as despair, held back until that moment, crushed her and she literately hung her head in defeat. This time the bad guys had won, she conceded, but Michael Killeen wouldn't savor his victory. She would not give him the satisfaction, she vowed, and grabbed a hand towel from the rack next to the sink, wrapped it tightly around her fist and slammed it into the large mirror above the double sinks.

Dean had been waiting for her just outside the bathroom door, arms folded, his rear end leaning against the dresser when he heard the shattering glass. "Fuck," he said under his breath and tried the door only to find it locked, lousy protection at best. He rammed his shoulder into the door and it slammed back against the wall with a crash. Surprised but not shaken, Erin Scott turned to him, a seven inch jagged piece of mirror clutched tightly in her bare hand and he hesitated, wondering whether she was planning on using it on him or herself. Either way she would come up the big looser, he knew as he walked slowly but purposefully toward her.

Erin brandished the large sliver of glass in front of her and he stopped. He even took a step back but smiled all the same.

"Stay away from me you sick fuck," she commanded then asked him, "Or do you get off on playing with your prey before you kill it?" To answer her question he lunged at her and light glinted off the shard of glass as, instead of going for him, she tried to swipe it across her own throat.

Grabbing her hand with his Dean squeezed down, the sharp edges of the glass slicing into tender flesh. "You stupid fool," he muttered and jammed the thumb she had bitten into her wrist as hard as he could.

Erin grimaced in pain determined to hang onto the weapon but, with the pressure he applied to her tendons and nerves, her fingers grew numb and the shard fell to the floor shattering into tiny pieces. Blood began to splatter in fat drops onto the white tile while fat tears of frustration began to roll down her cheeks.

Grabbing a towel Dean applied pressure to the wounds and watched as the fabric turned crimson. He applied pressure to her hand and within minutes the bleeding had slowed enough for him to assess the damage. Deep cuts marred the crooks of all four fingers and her palm but, as he flexed her fingers, he didn't think there was any tendon or ligament damage. She tried to pull away from him but he held onto her and just stared at the blood. It covered her hand and had dripped down her arm and spattered on the floor and, looking up, he trapped her gaze with his and, never breaking eye contact with her, lifted her hand to his lips and placed a soft, lingering kiss on her bloodied palm.

"Are you crazy?" she hissed and he wondered if he wasn't.

Erin let him lead her docilely to the shower but inside the tile and glass cubicle she pulled away from him and leaned her head against the tiles and let the jets of hot water pummel her. It stung her cuts as it sluiced down her arms to her hands but she didn't care. She just wanted out of the nightmare.

While she was lost in her misery Dean was suddenly naked and standing behind her, his good hand gently massaging her knotted shoulder muscles. "Don't!" she warned him and tried to move away but his fingers encircled her neck and squeezed. He was still the boss, still in charge, literally held her life in his hands and still she didn't care. "Do it," she challenged lethargically all the fight gone out of her flowing down the drain with the water just like her blood.

"Not yet," he said softy, his lips to her ear. His hand dropped easily from her neck down to cup one of her breasts and he squeezed gently. She moaned in spite of herself he figured and swallowed hard, his throat rippling against her ear. Backing away from her he picked up a bar of soap and began to lather her back in slow, sensuous circles.

As he did Erin blocked all thought from her mind and just let the sensations wash over her until his arm encircled her waist and he pulled her away from the shower heads, spinning them both around. Dean pushed her toward the opposite wall and hoisted her up. Knowing what he wanted she encircled his waist with her legs as he held her up, his cast rough on the tender skin of her thighs, and just stared down into his face.

Backing her up against the wall, her soap slicked back slid easily up the wall as he lifted her and impaled her on his swollen cock. Closing her eyes he watched her as he slid her up and down the wall until her breath quickened and her mouth opened slightly, tongue licking her lips. Suddenly, he felt her nails digging into the bunched muscles of his shoulders and, glancing down, he saw a trickle of blood running down his chest from the still oozing cuts on her hand.

Looking back up into her face she squeeze her eyes tighter and moan and he knew she was about to come. He brought his hips forward and slammed into her faster again and again and when he knew he couldn't hold back any longer he growled at her, "Look at me. Look at me, God Damn you," and she did as she was told.

Her eyes opened, a wordless challenge blazing from them and his captive began to fuck him back in return until she stiffened and bucked against him and bit her bruised lips determined not to cry out or to show any emotion at all. When the killer came, a combination of grunts and moans escaping his lips as he pushed forward, she climaxed again and never felt anything as intense or hating anything more.

Letting her down slowly, easily Dean rested against her pinning her to the wall as they both panted like dogs. Closing his eyes he smiled. It was a relaxed and genuine smile and he didn't know if it was the cocaine or simply the chemistry that was the root of his insatiable desire for the woman...and at that point he didn't really care.


	7. Chapter 7

Dean Bendis' interest in Erin Scott had started two weeks earlier when she'd come walking into Clovis' office and introduced herself as Sarah Miles. Sleekly dressed in a dark power suit with a white silk blouse, her shining blonde hair twisted and pinned up at the back of her neck. For all intents and purposes she looked and spoke like a lawyer-except for her 'fuck me' Christian Louboutin high heels. She may have looked the part of a lawyer but the reasons she was in California were anything but legal and, after taking her credentials and her letters of credit, Clovis invited her to join him for dinner. Dean suggested Spago, in Beverly Hills, because Clovis may have had more money than God but he didn't know the difference between a Michelin star and a Michelin tire.

Later that night Dean watched as a Mercedes Benz pulled up in front of the restaurant and Sarah Miles gracefully exited the vehicle looking the lawyer no more. She wore a floor length emerald green Versace accessorized with platinum and diamonds and open toed, strappy, crystal studded Louboutins that fairly screaming 'fuck me, now!'. The dress was stunning and split so far up the front that Dean bet he could bang her against any wall and she wouldn't even have had to lift her skirt. As they sat sipping cocktails Dean prayed for the opportunity to test out his theory and, as he silently watched her, he was pretty sure she could see it in his eyes.

For the most part she and Clovis talked business while Dean, dressed in a gray pin stripped Ermenegildo Zegna dress suit, sipped vodka martinis and was content to just relax, his arm draped on the back of his chair, his suit coat open just enough for her to see the butt of his gun. It didn't seem to faze her in the least.

Being in the restaurant did make Bendis uneasy, though. He tried to avoid going anywhere with Clovis for fear of someone recognizing him although he didn't think his own mother would recognize him now with his short cropped hair and the stubble on his face. Clovis had insisted he accompany them and, when the crime boss received a phone call and left the room, Dean skirted around the table and took the vacated seat next to Sarah Miles to tell her why.

Erin pulled back from him as if his proximity disgusted her so he put his hand on the back of her chair and leaned into her personal space and inhaled deeply. "Marc Jacobs' Essence. It suits you," he said in a soft voice.

"Please go back to your seat, Mr. Killeen," she said haughtily, dismissing him as the hired help she knew him to be.

He leaned back, his head cocked at an angle, and stared at her until she become uncomfortable and swallowed nervously. His mission accomplished, he leaned in to speak quietly to her again. "Mr. Clovis usually doesn't invite me to come along on his conquest dinners," he said.

Her eyes turned to blue steel and she interrupted him. "If all goes well Mr. Clovis' and my relationship will be strictly business..." she started but stopped briefly when Dean placed his hand on hers and held on tightly when she tried to pull it free. She then finished, "Not that it's any business of yours."

"Oh, but it is," he assured her, "And...if all does not go well, if you turn out to be anyone other than who you say you are, well, Mr. Clovis invited me along...to kill you."

Erin knew her cover was air tight and, when she spotted Clovis coming back into the dining room, all smiles and glad handing a number of diners as he made his way toward the table, she told Dean softly, "You'd better back off, fuck stick, or I'll have your job...and your balls."

Dean leaned back in Clovis' seat and laughed. He then asked as he got up to return to his seat, "You suck your boyfriend's dick with that mouth?"

Erin chose to disregard his crass comment, flashed a dazzling smile when Clovis sat back down next to her and pretty much ignored Dean the rest of the night.

With dinner over the three of them stood outside Spago in the warm night air waiting for the valet. Clovis' hand pressed the small of Erin's back intimately as he apologized again to her for the interruptions and flipped open his phone yet again. It was then that Carter Shaw came out of the restaurant...alone. Catching sight of him out of the corner of his eye Clovis snapped his phone shut and motioned for him to join them. Clovis shook his hand and said to him, "Mr. Smith, I see you're finding your way around town."

"Please," Carter replied, "I've asked you to call me Avery," he said then added, "I only wish I'd been able to find as beautiful a companion."

Clovis laughed coarsely. "You might change your mind about her, Avery. This is Sarah Miles from St. Louis and she's just outbid you."

Carter took her hand in his and gently brushed his lips across the top as southern custom dictated. Erin met his eyes and, not lost on Dean, she offered him the smile she'd withheld from both him and Clovis. Carter lowered his gaze for a moment to loop his white silk scarf around his neck, the finishing touch to his midnight blue Armani suit, and looked back up at her. Still smiling he said in his thick southern accent, "Win or loose you'll still be a vision."

Watching her blush Dean faded into the background waiting impatiently for the valet to hand over the keys to Clovis' Mercedes Maybach 62 and the keys to his own Saleen. He'd surmised correctly that Carter had caught a cab for the trip from his hotel and, when it arrived, Carter offered Erin a ride.

"Thank you very much but that won't be necessary, Mr. Smith. I see my driver now," she said indicating the Mercedes CL600 queuing up in the drive.

Wanting to find out more about the newest player in town Carter then suggested that they all head back inside for a nightcap and, not waiting for her reply, he dismissed his cab with a handsome tip for the cabbie and walked around the CL600 to speak to Erin's driver. "Mizz Miles has graciously accepted my invitation for a nightcap. I will see that she gets back to the hotel safely. You have my word as a gentleman," he said pleasantly but dismissively.

Davis Colly was indeed Sarah Miles driver but he was also her partner and, though he was loath to let her too far out of his sight, he could do nothing when she acquiesced and told him he could go. He would wait up for her at the hotel because, with her out on the town with the well-dressed but true dregs of society, sleep wasn't likely in the offing

Franklin Clovis was interested in neither sleep or nor a nightcap; especially with Avery Smith. He was interested in fucking Sarah Miles of St. Louis but Carlo Fiore was leaving in a few hours to reroute a shipment of AK-47's before they entered the Port of Seattle and became the property of the ATF and he had to be at the airport to give his subordinate his instructions and to see him off.

Clovis disliked Carlo Fiore but the man had connections out the ass and he liked having the sycophant around to offset the cold and aloof Michael Killeen. He liked it when he would tell Carlo that the sky was red and Carlo would say he was right and oh, so clever to have noticed while Michael Killeen would say, never in words but in demeanor and attitude, that the sky was not red but blue and to go fuck himself. It also seemed to Clovis that, while he had been out in the foyer of the restaurant getting the low down on Sarah Miles, she had told Killeen to do just exactly that.

She had all but ignored his man throughout the entire meal even though the killer couldn't keep his eyes off of her and now, anger in his voice, Clovis made his apologies and ordered Killeen to go home while Carter also dismissed Dean, in no uncertain terms, and went back inside with the woman.


	8. Chapter 8

Carter Shaw and Sarah Miles sat together at a cozy table next to one of the large windows overlooking the restaurant's courtyard. Carter talked about his life, good, bad or otherwise, in Baton Rouge, a city neither of them had ever been to, while she told him about growing up on the wrong side of everything in St. Louis, a city they were both familiar with. Sarah Miles was fairly vague about her connections and her reasons for wanting the massive amount of drugs and arms offered by Clovis but he figured she was more than likely negotiating for the St. Louis mob while he had come to the table ostensibly as his own agent.

Carter plied her with alcohol, which she seemed to handle very well easily keeping up with him and growing more at ease as the night wore on, never loosing her poise, her charm or grace and he found that, as well a being a beautiful blonde, she was extraordinarily astute. To make his cover more believable, and to make him appear more human to her, the forty seven year old undercover cop included snippets of his actual life, his childhood, the loss of his wife, his obsession with work and, though he hadn't started out to seduce her, he found that after a couple of hours of pleasant conversation he was well on his way.

Erin Scott truly liked the elegant Southerner who sat opposite her. She appreciated his quick wit, his intelligence, his beautiful blue eyes and the way he smiled at her...and the way he smelled, woodsy with just a hint of high priced musk. As she talked to him she almost forgot he was one of the bad guys...almost. She thought that with his charm and his intellect he could have easily gone into any business but, as he told her, the boardrooms were now filled with white collar criminals who lied, cheated and stole and, although he did the exact same thing, he didn't have to work nearly as hard. He always knew exactly who the bad guys were and that crime actually paid, very, very well.

Outside the restaurant Carter hailed another cab and, running true to form, Clovis had booked Sarah Miles into the Four Seasons and on Carter's floor. It was easier to bug rooms if they were in close proximity. As the taxi moved through the darkened streets their conversation waned as jet lag and Grey Goose with a twist took its toll on the DEA agent and Carter caught her out of the corner of his eyes as she tried to stifle a yarn. Slipping his arm around her he gently pulled her into the crook of his arm and she laid her head on his shoulder breathing in his heady cologne as they traveled the rest of the way to the hotel in silence.

The cab pulled into the circular drive, briefly illuminating the silver Saleen parked on the side street, and stopped to let the couple out. Carter paid the driver and escorted the woman inside and past Dean, who sat well out of sight in the lobby. Bendis knew Carter's room number and also knew that Sarah Miles was only two doors down. As the two of them checked for messages at the front desk he beat them to their floor and watched as they hesitated, deep in conversation, in front of her door. Then, taking her hand in his, Carter led her to his room where they disappeared behind a locked door.

Inside the room Carter took her shoulders, turned her, then pushed her gently back against the wall and whispered huskily into her ear, "I've been wantin' to do this all night." Slipping his hand between the enticing split in her gown he trailed his fingers slowly up her inner thigh and found not even the tiniest silken hindrance to the promise land. She had been naked beneath the Versace the whole evening and he almost came at the mere thought of it. He did managed to unfasten and drop his trousers before lifting and spreading her legs and sliding into her.

The construction of the classic building kept his vigorous thrusting, as well as her passionate moans, from being heard in the adjoining rooms but Carter wasn't a kid anymore. Holding her in his strong arms he moved to the large bedroom and fell backwards onto the bed never breaking their intimate connection. Erin was now on top and took charge slowly rising up to hover for a split second before sliding back down his thick shaft as it filled her completely. It only took her a few more minutes of riding him to feel him buck deep inside of her and she exploded, crying out, her head thrown back gasping for air.

Erin started to fall back to earth and Carter allowed himself his release and fell with her. But he wasn't finished with her yet and within minutes he had removed the silken lengths of the shining emerald gown and, refusing to let her remove her satin, crystal encrusted heels, he pointedly ignored the fact that there were probably surveillance cameras all over the room and made love to her again and again each time trying to fill the empty hole inside of him.

Dean was still stationed down the hall when Erin had finally gone to her room wrapped in a complimentary thick fleecy bathrobe, her dress in one hand, her heels dangling from her fingertips. He begrudged the hell out of Carter for his one night stand and could only imagine what had gone on until the wee hours of the morning.

A week later he didn't even need his imagination. Clovis showed him the surveillance video from Carter's room and, shaking his head, he said, "I could have sworn that Southern fried asshole was gay," and, although it wasn't the reason he had assaulted Erin Scott, it was more than likely the reason he hadn't let Avery Smith make the offer for her. He'd refused to turn her over just to spite Carter Shaw. But what was done was done and he had Erin Scott now and his taking of her was violent, exquisite and he wondered who really held whom captive now as she kept up with him kiss for kiss, thrust for thrust, giving as good as she got.

After her initial subjugation and forced compliance to his demands, Erin Scott had become surly and stopped meekly acquiesce to his brutality and he now had to earn his release. It had become a game...a game at which they both excelled. It was a game where the two of them communicated on the basest of levels, where no words were needed, only the caress of a hand or a mouth and intense, sometimes brutal coupling. It was a contest of wills, of strength and, at times, Dean felt as if he were loosing. But to loose to her was so overwhelming and sexually satisfying that he didn't care. He lost to her again and again and, as he lay next to her in the big bed listening to her soft, steady breathing, he thought about how he had come to this point in his life.

Dean Bendis had been taught that, in certain situations, the trick was to go in small but with a quiet reputation, one of mostly innuendo but with whispers of truth. With his reputation preceding him Dean had worked his way up through the ranks in a timely manner. He had manipulated the situation so that he didn't have to stay under for what felt like an eternity and, after three grueling months, he was not the king of the dung hill but he was most assuredly the prince. He was Clovis' second in command a vital cog in the workings of the man's vast empire of sleaze and Dean wondered if the stench of death and corruption would ever leave him and, if they lived through it, would Erin Scott ever forgive him. He didn't give a flying fuck whether Carter forgave him or not.


	9. Chapter 9

"Why'd you fuck him?" His voice brought her fully awake but, instead of turning to face Dean, Erin kept her back to him.

"Fuck who?" she asked, the 'you asshole' silent.

"Avery Smith."

"And you know this how?"

"Well, for one, the way he looks at you..." he said then paused.

"And two?" she asked evenly.

"And two, Clovis has it all on tape."

Erin barked a bitter laugh and finally turned to him.

"He took great pleasure in showing it to me," Dean told her and she smiled mirthlessly.

"And did you get off?"

"Fuck no," he said hotly and rising up to rest on an elbow he asked her again. "Why'd you fuck him? As part of your cover?"

"That's frowned upon at DEA, so no, not as part of my cover."

"Why then?"

She thought about it for a minute remembering something in Avery Smith's eyes, something in his voice when he asked her to make love to him and she answered truthfully, "Because he asked me to."

Her answer surprised him. He never knew Carter Shaw to ask for anything...except for your loyalty and the truth and Carter Shaw didn't ask, he demanded. Dean had never really seen Carter with any woman and there were rumors that his wife had left him because of his commitment to the job, his almost single handed campaign to right that which was wrong. Other rumors had it that she'd died also because of his commitment to the job. Whatever had happened, it had been a long, long time ago and in a city far, far away.

"Would you have fucked me if I'd have asked?" he queried.

She snorted. "Not in a million years...Mikey."

She never even hesitated and if he was honest with himself it hurt. But Dean Bendis was rarely honest with himself because, if he were, his job performance would suffer right along with his sexual performance, not to mention his conscience. It was better and so much easier to just do as he pleased, especially where women were concerned, Jamie Allen included. He'd told her he wanted no complications and she lied and said it was nothing, their coupling, but he could see it in her face when Nadia or Naomi or whoever had come out of his bedroom wearing next to nothing.

"Why?" he then asked.

Erin sat up in the bed, her back to him once again. She pulled up her legs and rested her chin on her knees and wondered if she could fuck him senseless then smother him with his pillow while he slept. "Listen, I have no doubt that we're a perfect match on "Chemistry dot com"," she started admitting freely that there was something between them, no matter how base, "But we're totally mismatched on Eharmony. I'm an agent of the federal government and swore an oath to uphold the law and you...swore an oath to the devil."

Dean sat up and turned to look at her, a quizzical look on his face, and she wondered what was wrong with him. Did he really not know right from wrong? Did he really not know that murder was against the law and, if he couldn't bring himself to respect man's law, did he really not know that it was against God's law? Maybe he didn't, she thought.

Clovis had not only delighted in showing Michael Killeen his sex tape of her and Avery Smith but days before to intimidate her, she supposed, he had shown her the tape of Michael Killeen killing an unarmed man, spitting on the body before walking away.

Dean smiled. Oh, he'd made a deal with the devil all right, Carter Shaw. But not even the devil could have planned this cluster fuck. Maybe it _was_ God and Dean remembered how his mother had always said that if you wanted to make God laugh, tell him your plans. He wasn't sure he believed in God anymore and thought that more than likely it had been a fucked up twist of fate that had dumped a DEA agent into the middle of an LAPD bust. "And after tonight, you think St. Smith's gonna take all those guns and all that heroin and just dump it into the gulf?"

Erin turned to him and wondered just why she _had_ fucked Smith and conceded, "You're right. Smith's just as bad if not worse than you and it's true, I did dance with the devil...and I liked it," she told him and watched as his eyes darkened.

"Good because as soon as the deal goes down you can tell Satan in person," Dean sneered and her face blanched.

She had known that death was coming eventually but still she was stunned and she just sat and watched as Dean walked naked to his closet and pulled out a garment bag from the Four Seasons. He came back to the bed and threw it at her and when she unzipped it she saw the green Versace.

"The shoes are in there, too," he told her and she looked up at him with uncertainty.

His smile would have been beautiful had his eyes held even the least bit of warmth but they were shining brightly and looked as hard as glass and in a frigid voice he told her, "I want you to wear this."

Erin opened her mouth to tell him that if he liked it so much he should wear it himself but a new look in his eyes stopped her. She let him finish.

"The last thing I want Avery Smith to see in this life is you wearing this...when I shove you up against the wall and fuck the shit out of you."


	10. Chapter 10

Franklin Clovis' minions worked steadily loading the tractor trailer with crates of varying sizes, each one holding weapons of various styles and calibers as he, Fiore, Smith and a fourth man watched from the sidelines. Much to Clovis' chagrin the southerner had brought in his own driver and Ty Curtis, dressed in overalls and a baseball cap pulled low over his eyes, stood next to Carter. Clovis watched the black man spit a greasy wad of chewing tobacco onto the warehouse floor with disgust and shook his head slowly while Ty just shrugged his shoulders and smiled a half-assed apology.

Carter ordered him to discard the tobacco in a trash filled 55-gallon metal barrel that stood next to the wall and, leaning in to spit out the offensive wad, Ty surreptitiously picked up and pocketed the handgun Dean had taped to the barrel's sidewall. With a slight nod to Carter he returned and took his place next to him.

Ty was armed but where was Bendis, Carter wondered? There were eight other men in the warehouse beside Clovis and Fiore, who looked the worse for wear, and a Glock 17 even with its seventeen round clip wasn't going to be enough to go up against the Uzis held at the ready by the six men not loading.

A ruckus broke out at the rear of the truck, punctuated by catcalls and whistles, and Carter spotted Erin Scott dressed in the green evening gown and wondered what the fuck Dean had been thinking. Carter had asked Clovis to bring her, to let him know she was still alive and well before he would transfer the cash and take ownership of the guns but he'd expected her to be dressed ready to duck and run if necessary and not to paint the town.

Dean, his hand wrapped tightly around her upper arm, dragged her over to where Carter, Clovis, Ty and Fiore stood. Carter noticed the H and K MP5SD3 loaded with a thirty round box slung over Dean's shoulder as did the others, Fiore's eyes ratcheting down to slits. Clovis smiled like a Cheshire cat and, by the look in his eyes, he still wanted to fuck Scott while Fiore, his eyes hard and cold, most assuredly wanted to kill them both.

"Okay, Smith," Clovis started, "She's here and, as you can see, she's as good as new...isn't she, Killeen?"

"Better," Dean replied looking directly into Carter's eyes. This time there were no subtle signals relating to the bust, only a slightly mocking look on Dean's face and fire in Carter's eyes as they stood facing one another.

Jamie had been watching the warehouse bay doors from across the street when Dean entered with the DEA agent in tow. They had eyes on the inside and she now watched on monitors as the two of them joined the others standing near the almost fully loaded semi truck. She could do nothing but wait for Carter to transfer the money and send her the signal that the buy had gone down. Captain Maynard and Erin Scott's C.O., Special Agent in Charge Mathew "Mac" McLeod, sat with her in the surveillance van. His detail as well a a S.W.A.T. team stood at the ready while ATF waited in the wings to take charge of the weapons.

In the wings was exactly where Maynard had wanted to plant DEA's ass but he had ended up begrudgingly letting them partner in on the bust. A no brainer when "Mac" had threatened to supersede Maynard's command unless his guys were in on it. Maynard sighed and Jamie glanced quickly at him, the frown on his face pronounced, and knew exactly what he must have been thinking. They had done all the dirty work and now the feds were going to take all the glory.

But it wasn't the glory, or lack there of, that had caused Carter to almost blow a gasket when Ty told him about the federal agents that would be working with them. It was the fact that federal agents tended to be 'shoot first, ask questions later' mutherfuckin' cowboys and all Carter wanted to do was to take Clovis alive and get his guys, along with agent Scott, out in one piece. Something an itchy trigger fingered Fed might make difficult if damn near impossible.

The money transfer began and Jamie nodded to the DEA SAC who began passing the word "to hold until his signal" down the line.

Inside the warehouse Carter lowered his phone and smiled at Clovis. "You should have confirmation any second now," he drawled, "and I'd be willing to add another cool million to help make your little problem here go away," he said nodding toward Erin.

"I appreciate your offer but it's just a small matter of a bullet to the brain and 'problem solved'," Clovis said calmly shrugging his shoulders.

Fiore raised the gun he'd kept hidden behind his back and pointed it at the DEA agent and smirked at Dean. At Clovis' behest he would first shoot Erin Scott, then Michael Killeen, thereby solving all of Clovis' problems.

As McLeod watched it all unfolding from the van he assessed the situation and word shot down the line that the bust was a go. Bombs went off at the locked doors and black clad agents began to pour into the building shouting that they were DEA and for those inside to put down their weapons. No one listened as the Uzis began to cough.

Return fire chattered all around them and Fiore squeezed the trigger but Dean pushed Erin aside and the bullet meant for her hit him dead in the upper region of his bullet proof vest, breaking his collar bone. He went down heavily while Clovis and Fiore, both now trying to tie up loose ends, took shots at Carter and Ty then headed into the office.

Ty pulled the gun from his pocket and pushed Carter behind the truck while Erin knelt on the ground next to Dean trying to get the MP5 off of him. She rolled him over on his side and jerked the strap up and with the gun securely in her hands slipped off the safety. With a grunt Dean grabbed for the gun but she rose up and just stood in the cavernous warehouse, the cacophonous roar of gunfire echoing all around them, the automatic weapon pointed straight at him. If she shot him where he lay no one would question the fact that he had been wounded and unarmed. Nor would they question her or blame her. She would go through her psyche evals and lie her way to a clean bill of health and A.I.D. would call it a righteous kill...but then she would be no better than him.

Motioning for him to get up Dean Bendis got to his feet and, raising his hands, he was remanded into the custody of the Drug Enforcement Administration when Erin's fellow agents surrounded one of their own protectively and trained four assault rifles on him.

LAPD rounded up Carter and Ty while S.W.A.T. took care of business inside the office. The op was over, finished in just minutes and both Fiore and Clovis lay dead, several bullets wreaking havoc on their bodies, while the others in Clovis crew were either dead or spread eagle on the ground. Michael Killeen stood, hands raised painfully above his head as a female LAPD officer slammed him up against the wall to assume the position.

Erin crossed over to where he stood and heard him hiss as his hands were savagely pulled down and cuffed behind his back, his obvious injury causing him some serious pain. Grabbing him roughly, the female officer turned him to face the door through which a cruiser waited to take him away and his eyes locked one final time with Erin's. "Wait!" she said, her quavering voice and trembling hands surprising her as did the genuine sorrow she'd seen in his eyes, "He saved my life."

Jamie Allen, dressed in her standard issue police uniform and bullet proof vest, pushed the woman out of the way and said under her breath, "That's what he's paid to do."

When Erin tried to speak to her again Jamie just ignored her and shoved Dean out through the door. Mac McLeod then came to stand next to her and reached out a gentle hand. She shrank away reflexively from his touch. Damn it, McLeod thought as he stood before his agent in his subdued camos and wondered what the son of a bitch Killeen had done to her. "Let's go, Erin," he said softly but firmly, "I want you checked out at the local hospital before we go wheels up."

Erin Scott was out of one bad situation and well on her way into another and, as Carter watched her leave, Ty, now wearing a regulation LAPD jacket and ball cap, walked up to him and pulled the handkerchief from the breast pocked of Carter's suit and pressed it to his boss's head just at the hairline. Carter pushed his hand away, his adrenalin spiking wildly. He needed a wide berth if only for a minute.

"Hey, Dapper Dan," Ty said lightly, "You got hit. You need to go to the hospital...or at least see a medic."

Carter looked at the bloody piece of material Ty held out for his inspection, "Just a scratch," he replied woodenly and touched the source of the burning pain on his scalp. His fingers came away bloody and when Ty tried to check his eyes Carter scorched him with a look and he backed off. "Where's Bendis?" Carter asked, still no emotion in his voice.

Ty told him that Jamie had already taken him away...but what he didn't tell him was where she had taken him. Closing his eyes Carter stepped in close to Ty and said in a quiet voice, "I need you to get to Clovis' before anybody else does...especially the Feds. Clovis has a video of Dean. It's in the safe in his office. You need to bring it to me."

"You know I can't do a safe without some prep," Ty started but Carter cut him off.

"It's a tin box," he snapped, "It won't take you more than five minutes," and before he had even finished speaking, Ty was out the door shedding his cap and jacket as he went.


	11. Chapter 11

Jamie drove toward his place in the city, Dean in the back of the cruiser, his body contorted awkwardly, his forehead resting uncomfortably against the window. His hands were still cuffed behind his back and, if Jamie could have seen his face, she would have known immediately that there was something wrong, something other than the first stages of cocaine withdrawal. He had already begun to shake and to sweat profusely against the cool glass but it was the shooting pain in his shoulder and down his arm that was the cause of his misery. "Jamie, please," he begged yet again and she turned deaf ears to his pleas for her to take him to the hospital.

If she took him to Good Samaritan and the doctors got a good look at him or drew blood for any reason; he would be out on his ass. She also suspected that he knew that the DEA agent he'd saved by jumping in front of a bullet would still be there for observation and the last people she wanted him to deal with were the pricks she had just spent two days bringing up to speed. The rumor mill had been running overtime in Denver, where Erin Scott was headquartered, as soon as she and agent Colley had gone missing and, though no one but those involved knew what really happened, her boys were out for blood so the hospital wasn't an option.

Pulling into Dean's driveway she noticed that Ty wasn't there yet so she kept Dean in the handcuffs and led him up to the darkened front door, a flashlight in her hand. "Is it safe?" she asked lifting his drooping head and his eyes refocused on her.

"What? Yeah, it's okay. The key's on the ledge."

"Not very original, Bendis," she said reaching for it.

He snorted. "Yeah but the switch plate in the foyer _is_ so watch your step."

Jamie looked at him in disgust and wondered what he would have done if she'd come to him unannounced in the middle of the night? Probably tell the coroner her that she should have called first. She silently chastised herself because, unfortunately for her, Dean Bendis was not the type of man to be tied down or to give his house key easily.

Once inside they navigated around the small oval rug in the hallway and she dragged him into his bedroom and pushed him down to sit on his bed.

"You gonna take these off me now?" he asked with an impatient sigh and a grimace. Jamie smiled and leaned in and kissed him soundly and, responding in kind, he closed his eyes and kissed her back. She rammed the hypodermic home and, furious, he head butted her and she fell backwards, momentarily stunned. "You bitch!" he rasped trying awkwardly to stand but instead fell onto his back, a scream of pain and frustrated rage ripping from his throat.

Much to Jamie's relief he closed his eyes as he passed out. She removed the cuffs and his clothing and, noting the massive bruise on his upper torso, maneuvered him fully onto the mattress and manacled his wrists and ankles to the bed. She'd just finished hooking him up to an IV for hydration and more sedation when she heard Ty's car.

Skirting the switch plate he knew Dean used to booby trap his house when he was out on assignment, Ty walked into the bedroom and found Dean restrained and sedated and Jamie her fingers prodding a bump on her forehead as she looked in the mirror.

Ty grabbed her chin and turned her face to him and, deducing the obvious, he asked her with a crooked smile, "He give you any trouble?"

Jamie laughed and shook her head, "Not any more than usual." Her bruise was the least of their problems and she crossed over to the bed and grabbed the sheet to show him.

"Hold on, girl," Ty said grabbing her hand, "I know this op is done but there are a few parts of Dean Bendis that need to stay undercover." When she didn't laugh at his lame joke and her brow remained furrowed with concern, he let her pull down the sheet to show him the damage. "He took a slug," Ty said stating the obvious. He pressed down on Dean's chest where the bruising was the darkest and even in his sedated state the undercover cop moaned. "I think his clavicle's busted," he told her and she looked questioningly at him. "Nothing to do for it but immobilize his arm but, by the looks of your head, I don't think we can un-cuff him until the worst of this is over."

Rubbing her forehead Jamie had to agree with him.

"So what happens next?" Ty asked as he set a number of DVD's down on the dresser and pulled off his jacket.

"You forget to stop at Blockbuster?" Jamie asked him and he laughed.

"Carter wanted me to get these from Clovis' office before the feds got there."

"What's on 'em?"

"Who knows? Dean said that Clovis was one paranoid son of a bitch."

"Aren't we all," Jamie replied thinking of Dean's booby trapped front entrance and then thought to ask, "Do I need to be worried when I put the toilet seat down?"

Putting her concerns to rest Ty laughed again and shook his head, "Nah, Dean figures if somebody's gonna come after him it'll be balls to the wall and through the front door. I'll disarm his little booby trap and take the black and white back before somebody misses it."

"How's Carter?" Jamie asked and Ty just shrugged.

"You know Carter. He'd never tell you if there was anything wrong," Ty said grabbing his jacket, "I'll be back as soon as I can."

"He'll be out for at least four hours. Why don't you go see Melissa before you come back?"

"You'll be okay?"

"Sure," she assured him then pointed to the DVD's, "All I need is some popcorn."

When Ty came back in the morning, freshly showered and shaved, Jamie sat in the curtained darkness of Dean's bedroom, his laptop still on her knees, the screen illuminating her face.

With a cursory glance at Dean, who remained in much the same position as when he'd left him, Ty removed his jacket and stood behind her to look over her shoulder. "Any award winners in the pile?" he asked and Jamie turned to look up at him, her eyes haunted.

"Oh, yeah," she said dully. She'd seen them all from start to finish, four or five staring Dean Bendis and Erin Scott and even one staring Erin Scott and Carter Shaw. But the one she'd played and rewound and played again maybe a hundred times was the one where Dean cold bloodedly shot a man in the head.


	12. Chapter 12

Stopping the "kill" video Ty Curtis didn't have the words. He didn't have the words but what he did have was faith. Faith that what you see is not necessarily what you get. There had to be more to it than Dean just whacking a troglodyte for the fun of it. The creep must have threatened Dean, had some kind of weapon that they just couldn't see. That was his hypothesis and he was sticking to it.

After switching discs and watching the first half hour of Dean Bendis and Erin Scott porn he hit the pause button. Ty knew his partner sometimes traveled to the beat of a different drummer and he knew for sure that he wasn't a cold-blooded killer but what he hadn't known, up until now, was that Dean Bendis had assaulted Erin Scott repeatedly...and he seemed to have enjoyed it.

Jamie had come to much the same conclusion and sat stoically on the edge of the bed monitoring Dean's vitals. She had always tried to hide her true feelings, to be a bad ass where Dean was concerned but she was failing miserably and found herself hesitant to even touch him after seeing something in him, in his actions and his demeanor, on the videos that bothered her much more than she cared to admit. While their coupling, yeah, she knew now that that was all it was, was forceful and sometimes a little rough he never once forced himself on her against her will and she didn't know if she could ever reconcile the fact that he had with Erin Scott.

Ty stopped the DVD altogether when he felt his breakfast coming back up on him and he closed his eyes and tried to wrap his head around it. Opening them again he spotted Jamie looking at him with a certain sadness in hers. "You know he didn't have a choice," Ty tried to explain to her as well as to himself and she huffed indignantly.

"Please," she said sarcastically, "Don't make excuses for him. It's disrespectful to Erin Scott, to your wife, to any woman."

"Don't get me wrong, this is bad, really, really bad but he was in a bad situation. Her cover'd been blow wide open and Clovis only brought her to him because he didn't have the balls to kill her himself."

Jamie got up off of the bed and began pacing, her anger and her disappointment growing. "So he really did kill that other guy...in cold blood," she said with disgust.

Ty looked at her. He tried to control his anger at her complete lack of faith in Dean because it was unfair and unwarranted. Jamie Allen may have slept with Dean Bendis but she hadn't been around long enough to even get a read on him let alone really know him. Yeah, Dean was capable of some pretty heinous deeds, as experience and the DVDs showed, but Ty truly believed that what Dean had done had been as a last resort...all of it. "Dean's not a murderer," he stated, "Or a rapist."

Jamie jumped his case. "No? Then who the fuck was on those DVDs?" she asked dashing errant tears from her eye.

Ty stood up and grabbed her wrist as she stomped past him and pulled her up short. "You haven been at this long enough to pass judgment on him. You haven't been around scumbags like Clovis and Fiore or psychopaths like Johnny Jerome for months on end," Ty pointed out, "I'm sure Dean had a good reason for whacking Johnny J and what Dean did to Erin Scott, well, that was a walk in the park compared to what Carlo Fiore would have done to her."

Jamie looked at him and wondered just how far Ty would go to protect Dean. How many lies would he tell her and himself?

He could see she didn't believe him so he continued, "We could never prove it but Johnny J burned up little children and Carlo Fiore...he was a modern day Jack the Ripper. He liked to cut up prostitutes...from the inside out. Something about his mother abusing him when he was a kid and him killing her for it when he was eleven...and having a small dick."

Jamie didn't laugh but shuddered at the thought and wondered if Carter Shaw had recruited the right person. Could she actually hang with the big dogs and do what needed to be done? She wasn't sure she could but she would cross that cesspool when she came to it.

She sat down on the bed again and sighed and wondered, what about Carter? Clovis' voyeuristic love story about two undercover cops ranked right up there with Gone With the Wind only frankly, my dear, Carter Shaw did give a damn. Jamie knew hot steamy totally consensual sex when she saw it and they had both been so into it that she wanted to know just how that played into the job description.

Only time and experience would give her the answers to her questions, she supposed, and, short of washing her eyes out with bleach and undergoing a lobotomy, the events that she had seen in glorious living color would play out in her mind for months to come. But for now, Dean called out to her weakly and then threw up on himself.

Ty wiped him down with a wet towel and Jamie readied another syringe but Dean seemed quite calm even with the pain. "Water," he begged and Jamie fed him ice chips and wiped his brow. His stomach jacked him up and his bowls let loose. "My bed," he whispered, his intestines cramping again, and Jamie assured him that she'd rubber sheeted it although he might want to buy a new mattress anyway when this was all over.

The two of them took turns changing bedding and bathing him, something Dean expected when he was a hundred not the tender age of thirty-two. He also never thought he'd have the opportunity or the means or the need to ratchet up his sporadic drug use to unmanageable levels. Taking a deep breath he managed to keep the bile in his stomach down. The smell of his own sweat was sickening and he desperately wanted a shower...and a hit.

Although at that particular moment Jamie Allen was his least favorite person in the world, right up there with Ty Curtis, but he felt worse if that was possible when he saw the bruise on her forehead. "Sorry," he whispered thickly.

Jamie smiled half-halfheartedly and when Ty volunteered to spell her for a while shee practically bolted form the room.

Watching her go Dean just said, "This is so fucked up."

"You don't know the half of it, brother," Ty assured him pointing to the stack of DVDs, "Carter wanted me to get those from Clovis' before the Feds did. You got some 'splaining to do, partner."

Dean didn't know what Clovis had recorded but if the douche bag was as methodical with him as he had been with Carter everything that had gone on in the guesthouse was his guess and he asked Ty, "Why'd you let her watch 'em?"

"I didn't have any idea what was on 'em. I thought she'd just get bored and wander off to YouTube or something," Ty said nonchalantly but he couldn't hide the look on his face.

"It isn't just Erin, is it?" Dean asked.

Ty took a deep breath. "That was bad enough but there's one of you shooting Johnny J right between the eyes."

Dean couldn't keep the bile down this time and he turned his head and puked it up along with all the water from the ice chips and, he was sure, his stomach lining. "The son of a bitch tried to shank me and he was a worthless piece of shit!" Dean said by was of an angry explanation and excuse.

Ty never doubted that something like that had gone down and Dean saw the relief in his partner's eyes and relaxed a little until pain started to claw at his body again just under the skin. He would have given his left nut to be able to wrap his arms around himself and just rock back and forth until it passed but then was strapped down spread eagle, unable to move and sweating like a pig and suddenly he wanted to kill somebody, anybody. A ragged scream tore from his throat followed by a bought of watery coughing. "Oh, God," he said practically drooling and closed his eyes.

"You want some more of the sedative?" Ty asked holding up the syringe

Willing himself to be still Dean shook his head. He had places to go and a DEA agent to see and the only way he was going to get the chance was if he got Ty or Jamie to uncuff him. "It's my collarbone and my busted hand. I need a hospital, man."

"There's nothin' they can do for your collarbone and your cast looks okay."

"All right," Dean conceded then tried a different tack, "But the stench. Jamie can hardly stand me. I need a shower or a bath or at least a douche with the hose."

Although the smell of the drug-laced sweat mixed with vomit was pungent, Ty didn't think it was his smell Jamie Allen found offensive so, friend that he was, he decided to let the two of them have some alone time together. "Listen partner, I'm gonna bounce and leave you here in Jamie's capable hands," and pointing to the DVDs he added, "You might want to explain to her about um, I don't know...everything."


	13. Chapter 13

Jamie watched apprehensively as the door closed behind Ty and she just stood and listened to the silence in Dean's small house. Looking around she saw that he hadn't bothered to clean up before leaving on assignment and, squatting down, she took a pen from the coffee table and dragged something out from under it. It was the dreaded thong but, instead of getting mad, she only snorted a laugh. No claim, no foul and when Scott came to mind she knew exactly where the foul lay.

"Jamie?"

Pushing the offensive bit of red lace back under the table with her boot tip she turned toward the bedroom door. The pit of her stomach was tired in knots and for a moment she didn't know if she could go back into the room but Dean moaned and began to cough up what could only be a lung. "Water," he said between hacks as she walked back into the room.

Jamie sat next to him again on the bed to feed him more ice chips. He looked worse than before; his face ashen, his breathing shallow and she wondered if he could be bleeding internally from the hit he'd taken to his Kevlar vest. Pulling down the sheet she did see that the bruising had darkened considerably but it still looked like your every day, run of the mill, cop bruise.

"I need something for the pain," he rasped out and she smiled thinly.

"Not happenin', Bendis," she said firmly, "We're not swapping one high for another."

Dean knew then and there that she really was the Antichrist and, ignoring the urge to rip the skin from his arms and legs only because he couldn't get his hands free, he closed his eyes and asked her, "What did you see on the videos?"

She sighed, looked away from him and said flatly, "Just you...whacking somebody and you again...sexually assaulting a DEA agent and...oh, yeah...Carter fucking Erin Scott like he was twenty years old."

"Yeah, pretty good for an old man," Dean said disdainfully.

Jamie was taken aback with his tone. He'd seen the video and it had pissed him off and she wondered why. Lifting her chin and rolling her head around in circles to ease the tension in her neck Jamie waited for him to continue.

"That guy you saw me snuff...I did it to gain Clovis' trust...and to put the fear of God into him at the same time." Pain rippled through him and he gritted his teeth and breathed through it.

"You killed an unarmed man to make a point?" she asked, his admission somehow diminishing him in her eyes.

"He had a blade so Jamie, baby, save your sympathy for somebody who matters. He was a maggot who murdered women and children, burned 'em alive...and I made my point."

Jamie sighed, her face growing as pale as his, and she pressed her cool hand to his cheek wanting to believe him, to believe in him.

When he saw her walls start to crumble he thought it would be best if he explained the rest of it. "Agent Scott...I had to do what I had to do."

"Very profound, Dean."

He rolled his eyes and found that even that hurt and he closed them again. "Clovis and Fiore both wanted her and I couldn't let that happen."

"I get it. In your twisted Neanderthal brains you were staking a claim but, come on, couldn't you have just told her who you were instead of tying her up and fucking her brainless for days on end?"

"You saw the tapes. When was I supposed to tell her? Hell, the shower was probably bugged and there was no way in hell I was gonna chance her going all complacent on me once she knew I wasn't a threat. Clovis would have spotted it in a minute."

Okay, she would give him that but why so rough she wanted to know.

"Erin was the Fed's Special Agent in Charge on the op. You know, college grad, sixteen weeks of ball busting training at Quantico just for openers. She's smart and a bitch on wheels and as far as she knew I killed her partner and I was gonna kill her, too. If I'd let her get the upper hand she would have handed me my balls on a silver plate."

"Oh, it's Erin now?" Jamie let it slip.

Dean needed to nip "it" in the bud. She was jealous and he knew he should set her straight but, at that moment, he needed her to trust him. "Jamie," he lied earnestly, his eyes staring directly into hers "She means nothin' to me. She was just part of the job."

"Well, you were getting pretty hot and heavy into your work, slick," she retorted.

He laughed. "You know I never do anything half assed, don't you babe?" he told her winking and it surprised her when she laughed. Another chill washed over Dean and he shivered so hard his muscles bunched and cramped up. "Listen Jamie, I've got money, lots of money, stashed away and it's all yours if.."

She looked hard at him ready to refuse his plea for just one more bump but he offered her all his wealth for just a chance to sit in a bathtub full of scalding water.

"Please, Jamie," he pleaded, his eyes sincere, "I smell like a wet dog...that rolled in something dead."

She laughed again and, wanting desperately to trust him, she made the mistake of un-cuffing him. When she collapsed he laid her gently on the bed and, after a quick shower, a change of clothes and his much needed bump...or three...he grabbed the keys to his Vmax and, checking on Jamie once more before he left, he leaned in and kissed her.


	14. Chapter 14

Erin Scott was dressed in a severe, black, business suit, the skirt cut short in the skirt to show off her long legs, the jacket cut wide to conceal her gun and holster and, her debriefing finished, she sat in Captain Maynard's office alone for the moment looking forward to the charter flight back to the Mile High City. After a fair night's sleep at the hospital the doctors had given her the once over and had pronounced her fit for travel, though not to return to duty, yet. That would come later after the departmental psychological evaluations and physical examination. Part of her team was already at the airport and her immediate supervisor was on his way to pick her up. She was pleased and relieved and very, very lucky to be leaving LA alive. The only thing she wished was that her partner was going home with them.

She had been hustled out of the warehouse and off to the hospital so fast that she'd never even had a chance to speak with anyone from her team and when she had been released Captain Maynard had kept her sequestered for hours, debriefing her, asking her to tell him what had gone on. Standard operating procedure for a bust of this importance and, although King Shit had gone out in a blaze of glory, both Michael Killeen and Avery Smith, to the best of her knowledge, were still alive and well and looking at twenty to life at a minimum.

Maynard had been especially interested in every sordid detail of her involvement with Michael Killeen including asking her if she knew anything about an alleged shooting. With everything else that had happened with Killeen Erin felt obligated to tell Maynard about the tape but she doubted that it would ever make it to or even stand up in court. The good Captain also asked her about Avery Smith and she told him about the meetings, the negotiations but she didn't tell him about the night they'd spent together in the hotel. As far as she was concerned it wasn't relevant to any court case they might be building against Smith and it was by far the closest thing she had to a fond memory of the nightmare she had just endured.

Her interviews over for now, Erin felt as if things were finally starting to get back to reality until she caught a glimpse of someone who looked amazingly like Avery Smith through the window. Her world became totally surreal again when the Avery Smith look-alike knocked on the door.

Carter announced his presence and his intention to come through the door and when he did Erin saw that it was in fact Smith but that instead of wearing a two thousand dollar suit the good looking, dark haired Southerner was now dressed down in jeans and a black tee shirt, the dark color highlighting the gold badge that hung from a lanyard around his neck. When he closed the door behind him and finally spoke to her, his words weren't delivered in a honey smooth southern drawl but with the clipped, slightly flat accent of a born and bred New Englander.

"Agent Scott, how are you feeling?" Carter asked hesitantly and, when she didn't answer him, he held out his hand and forged on, "I'd like to properly introduce myself. I'm Lieutenant Carter Shaw, LAPD." He waited for her to process what he'd just told her.

Erin closed her eyes and shook her head slightly and laughed derisively and refused to shake his proffered hand. "LAPD," she said as if she should have known.

"Yeah," he said almost sheepishly, "We've been working Clovis for almost four months..."

"And we come in and almost spoiled the party," she said pragmatically, shaking her head again.

"It was touch and go after your cover was blown," Carter agreed and not waiting for her to ask he took a seat in one of the chairs that surrounded the small conference table at which she sat.

"Yeah, who'd a thunk that one of Fiore's guys would be one of my old collars?" she said, her initial shock wearing off.

"Small world when it comes to criminals."

"And cops, too," she said thoughtfully. Erin looked at the man sitting opposite her and wondered how much of what they had shared had been complete and utter bullshit like his whole persona and she smiled but without any joy. It was embarrassing and rather sad that the short but immensely satisfying time that she had spent with him was based on lies and deceit.

"Listen," Carter started when he saw the hardening of her eyes, "About that night...in the hotel.'

She cut him off with a lift of her hand and said, "Its okay. All part of the job, right?"

He admitted in all honestly, "Not all of it."

Erin dismissed the whole episode summarily with a harsh laugh and assured him again of her ability to cope, "Its okay, I think my fragile ego can handle it."

Carter looked at her his blue eyes unclouded and guileless and her heart actually beat faster, her attraction to him still undeniable. "I admit I wanted to find out all I could about my competition but there was more truth than deception in everything I told you that night," he told her.

"And I'll take it to my grave, Lieutenant Carter Shaw, LAPD," she assured him glibly, her hands fidgeting nervously in front of her but he didn't smile.

Carter leaned in and took her hands in his, stilling them. He lowered his head and his voice and told her, "Me telling you about my life, about my wife...that was never part of the job and..." he stumbled for the briefest of moments, "you're the first woman I've been with...completely...since my wife."

Erin looked down at his hands. Carter Shaw held on so tightly that his knuckles had turned white and she was afraid that the emotion of his hard fought admission would end up with him breaking her fingers.

Realizing he was hurting her, he released her and stood up so quickly that his chair threatened to fall over backwards. "I'm sorry," he said brusquely as if embarrassed by voicing his feelings aloud to someone he barely knew but with whom he'd connected intimately.

As he stood Erin realized that he didn't have anything else to say to her and she was thankful for the respite because she didn't know what to say or what to think about his veiled affirmation of...what? She thought she knew what he was saying to her but it really didn't matter. The job was over and her night with him, as well as all her nights with Michael Killeen, would be packed away emotionally the way her bags were packed and waiting for her at the hotel. Erin would leave nothing behind, not a trace of herself, except for the green Versace.

Outside Maynard's office the dynamics of the busy room changed as two DEA agents entered the bullpen, both of them dressed in black suits, sporting expensive mirrored sunglasses. Carter caught movement out of the corner of his eye and said, "Looks like your guys are here to take you home."

Erin stood and just looked at him for a moment. Her eyes softened and Carter thought she wanted to say something but instead she turned her attention to the commotion outside the door, a drawn smile on her face. As she looked out of the window she thought she recognized a familiar gait and a familiar face hidden behind one of the pairs of sunglasses and her world tilted once again when the partner she thought dead and her boss came into the room.

"Hey," Davis Colley said almost self consciously, his arms hanging limply by his sides, "I'm so sorry, Scotty. They pulled me out before I even knew your cover was blown."

"Agent Colley has been enjoying our hospitality and fine weather for the past few days," Carter tried to explain to her but she ignored him and just stared at her partner.

He looked fit and none the worse for wear and Erin, after a short awkward silence, leaned in and hugged him fiercely, her eyes welling up. She had resigned herself to the fact that he was dead and had mourned his passing, bleeding emotionally for his wife and his kids all the while his alleged cold-blooded killer brutalized her.

"It's okay, Lassie," she said using the nickname she'd given him the first time she'd met him, "It wasn't your fault and it's over now." Glancing at Carter she added, "Let's just go home," and slipped on a similar pair of dark glasses to hide the tears that threatened to spill over her lashes.

Carter stepped back without another word and she walked briskly past him anxious to trade the stench of the City of Angels and her police force for the pure mountain air of Colorado and home. Unbeknownst to her she had one more stop to make.

Dean Bendis stood stoically in the doorway of the station house bullpen, his face unreadable as he watched her leave Maynard's office, head held high, walking ahead of her teammates. His head still told him that what he had done was right and that his actions had kept them both alive but he knew in his heart that much of what he had done to this woman was simply because he had allowed his baser nature to take over completely and he wanted her to know that, for that part, he was sorry.

Mrs. Bendis' youngest son had found out too late that he still had a tiny bit of the conscience she had tried to instilled in him and he was paying dearly for his sins. He had crossed over the line of decency long before Erin had come into the picture but it didn't excuse him or the things he had done, going under so deeply this time that a big part of him had actually relished the amorality, the brutality, the hedonistic existence of a man like Mike Killeen. His sociopathic foray into the heart and soul of a killer had been a frightening and heady and sexually stimulating trip but it was time for him to face the people he had run over along the way, not the least of whom was Erin Scott.

Erin Scott now knew that Avery Smith was not a drug dealer but an undercover cop. She also knew that her partner was not dead as she had been led to believe and now the man who had held her captive and used her so ruthlessly and who had so unashamedly enjoyed it stood waiting to re-introduce himself to her. As he watched her pass by the many desks on her way to the double doors leading to the hallway, Dean told himself again that what had happened could be excused, that it had all been a part of the job. His behavior had been an integral part of the operation as had the drugs and the killing of the torch and, if he continued to repeat his mantra of half-truths long enough, he might convince himself and even forgive himself in time. But would Erin Scott? Only time would tell.

Dean looked around and instead of confronting her in the crowded room full of plain-clothes detectives and dark blue uni's he stepped back out into the long hallway to wait for her there. In minutes Erin walked through the double doors talking easily with her teammates and, as she approached him, he said her name out loud. When she looked over at him he said to her, "I'm Dean, Dean Bendis, LAPD."

Erin looked at the man who stood before her now dressed in jeans and a dark forest green tee shirt, a gold badge at his chest. She took in the dark stubble on his face, his shorn head and looked into his green eyes. Eyes that she had looked into so many, many times before. Eyes that she would never forget. 'That's what he's paid to do.' That was what the snotty blonde bitch of a cop had said to her and she took in a deep breath and hissed out, "You bastard! You fucking bastard!"

The slap was like a gun shot in the quiet hallway but before she struck him Dean watched her face ran the gamut of emotions. Time told him everything in that few seconds when she recognized him and her eyes sparked with fury then turned a flinty blue-gray. He stood, silent and unmoving, ready to take his punishment and could only hope that, after the shock wore off and she had had time to decompress, to go over everything that had happened, she too would see that his treatment of her had been a necessary evil.

Dean had fully expected some sort of reaction from Erin but the right cross from her partner was totally unexpected. The brute force of it snapped his head back and he hit the wall hard, jarring broken bones. Ignoring the pain, he charged Davis Colley and butted his head into the man's chest and Scott's partner hit the opposite wall and went down.

Shoving Erin out of the way McLeod grabbed Dean by the shirtfront and punched him again and again until the undercover cop couldn't breathe or see. His ribs battered, his left eye beginning to swell shut, his nose more than likely broken, Dean staggered back against the wall as McLeod still hung on to him tenaciously.

Strong arms pushed and shoved until there was daylight between Mac McLeod and Dean Bendis and Carter Shaw pushed the big man back trying to protect his battered and bleeding man.

Growling angrily Dean tried to lunge again at the Unit Chief determined to finish what DEA had started but Ty, suddenly showing up out of nowhere, pushed him back up against the wall. "Dean! Dean, cool it, man!" he said pushing back on the still struggling Bendis while Carter tried to calm McLeod.

"Listen!" Carter shouted, "Sergeant Bendis is one of my undercover operatives."

McLeod cut him off. "You, motherfucker," he rasped out breathing heavily and pointing at Dean, "assaulted two Federal officers and, when this is all over, I'll have your badge."

"Fuck it," Dean said with a smile, his teeth red with blood, "Let's make it a hat trick," and, breaking away from Ty, he punched McLeod squarely in the nose.

Grabbing him again Ty immobilized Dean with a choke hold and Carter, who had up until that moment been debating on what to do with his senior agent, investigate the shooting of Johnny Jerome, test him for substance abuse or let sleeping dogs lie, made his decision, "Sergeant Bendis, you're on suspension until further notice."

Leaning in McLeod came bloody nose to bloody nose with Dean and said menacingly, "This isn't over, you punk." and waving an arm over his shoulder he motioned for his team to continue down the hallway, Colley keeping Scott well away from Dean.

McLeod backed away, blood gushing from his nose. He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and before he placed it to his nose he said to Carter, "Make sure you keep a tight leash on your bitch," and with that one parting shot DEA left the building.

Pulling away from Ty Dean watched as McLeod followed the others out of the building and, with blood dripping down the front of his shirt, he said under his breath, "Fucking jack off."

Carter heard him and with eyes like hardened steel said to Ty as if Dean were no longer there, "Get him the hell out of here before I jack him up myself," and without another word their team leader followed in DEA's wake.

Spitting blood onto the floor, Dean shouted after Carter angrily, "This is total bullshit, man!" Erin Scott's boss had gone to the wall for her and had beaten the crap out of him while his own boss had, in effect, kicked him to the curb.


	15. Chapter 15

Jamie sat on Dean's couch and looked up apprehensively as a key rattled in the door. Ty pushed it open and came inside dragging a sullen Dean Bendis behind him. Shaking himself loose from Ty's grip, his battered face caked with dried blood; Dean simply stood just inside the door and looked at her for a long, silent moment. Finally, with a sigh, he walked up to her and held up his hands and waited for her to zip tie him to the bed again.

"Uh, uh," she said shaking her head and turning away from his damaged face, "I had a long time to think about this and I can't help you if you don't wanna be helped."

"Jamie, I'm sorry," he told her truthfully, "I had something I had to do."

Looking back up at him and smiling coldly she asked, "Yeah, well how'd that work out for you, Dean?"

"Not so good," he said contritely, "But I'm ready now."

"Yeah, he is," Ty told her, "Carter put his ass on suspension." and, when she lifted an eyebrow, he added, "He jacked up Scott's partner _and_ her boss."

"It was self defense," Dean argued and Ty just snorted.

"You sucker punched The Highlander and you know it."

"Well, yeah, maybe but..." he started but Jamie interrupted him.

"This is what I mean," she said hotly, "The way you handled things when you were under, the way you are right now. You're a disgrace and a detriment to the department not to mention to Ty and me and I'm not putting my life in your hands anymore."

Stung by her assessment of him Dean lashed out, "No one asked you to, Jamie."

"You are such an asshole," she said standing up to grab her leather jacket, "Carter asked me to. He asks me to trust you to do whatever needs to be done ever time he sends us out together."

"And that's just what I did! What I always do!" Both Ty and Jamie looked at him as if he'd grown not only a second head but also a third and, staring at the two of them, he said under his breath, "Screw you" and walked into his bedroom.

Following him to the threshold Jamie leaned against the door jam and watched as he ran his hand along the wooden bedstead and produced a vial of cocaine. He then rummaged in his closet and produced two more and, with the three of them, in hand he crossed over to her and held them out as an offering. He sniffed as his nose began to bleed anew, not only from McLeod's fist but from his cocaine abuse, and he swallowed and said thickly, "Jamie, I'm begging you. Please help me."

Jamie knew how hard it was for him to at least make the effort but she would wait before giving him an A for it. "Any more where that came from?" she asked crossing her arms, the three vials held loosely in her hand.

"Not that you haven't already flushed down the crapper," he swore, his eyes sincere, the lie of necessity slipping easily from his tongue. His drug stash, along with his stacks of carefully wrapped cash hidden in the floorboards, were tools of his trade and he wasn't going to let her have either simply because neither of them thought he truly knew where to draw the line. But they were dead wrong. He would no more spend the money on fast cars and hookers than snort, shoot or smoke his stash and he held up his hands again in supplication.

"No cuffs, Dean. You talk a good game but that's what you do," Jamie said skeptically, "I'll help you but you gotta know that you're free to give up and leave anytime...but so am I."

She passed the vials off to Ty who stood behind her impressed as hell with her handling of his partner and friend. It took balls to call his bluff, he thought, heading for the bathroom to flush the coke down the toilet.

Dean watched longingly after the vials but he knew what he had to do if he wanted his suspension lifted. It would take more than just getting clean to get back into Carter's good graces. "What's next?" he asked Jamie lifting his hand to gently touch the bruise on her forehead and he felt like kicking his own ass when she flinched and sucked in her breath in pain.

Flashing back to the way he'd physically hurt her and the way he'd manipulated her just to get to Erin Scott he admitted to her, "I guess maybe there's a fine line between being addicted and being obsessed."

She nodded her head in agreement relieved that he was beginning to understand what she and Ty could plainly see. "It's called cognitive dissonance," she said and when he looked blankly at her she continued, "You were a good guy forced to do bad things. Dean Bendis verses Michael Killeen, Erin Scott verses the two of you. You rationalized what you did to her and, although she never fully capitulated, after a while the assaults turned to something else for the both of you. It only stands to reason that you would have feelings for her and she for you."

"When I saw her at the station, when I told her who I was, she slapped me," Dean admitted.

Jamie thought that if it had been her she would have probably tried to shoot him. "I didn't say they would necessarily be good feelings. In this case Erin Scott wasn't just a helpless victim. She did what she had to do in order to stay alive for one more day, in effect making you the victim of her self-serving choices; kind of like reverse Stockholm syndrome."

"Does Carter know you're not just another pretty face?" Ty asked Jamie with a laugh. He'd come back to stand behind her and listened as she psychoanalyzed Dean and watched the changes cross his partner's face as what she said to him sunk in. Ty also saw that Dean was only a few seconds away from caving and, shouldering his way past Bendis' new found shrink slash guardian angel, he grabbed Dean's shoulders and steered him toward the bed.

With Ty's help he lay back on the freshly washed sheets and watched as Jamie left the room to get wet washcloths to clean him up and bandages to patch him up. The black detective leaned in and repeated the gist of what she already told him. "This is all on you now, brother. No sedatives, no tie downs. You're free to go when and if you want...but if you bounce, we're done."

Dean closed his eyes and sighed wearily. He wiped his still leaking nose on the back of his hand and touched his eye tenderly. His face was swollen and composed but Ty could see his jaw working furiously and, whether it was in response to the coke or in reaction to Jamie's analysis of his over the top behavior, he was pissed.

They had been taught all about Stockholm syndrome and it's after effects and Dean knew it was something more just as Ty had figured that it wasn't just textbook psychology or even Dean's raging libido. For one thing the Dean Bendis he knew and loved would have never offered himself up for such a ferocious beating if he didn't care deeply for Erin Scott. He wished he could get this fact across to Jamie but knew love was blind...and deaf...and dumb...and a word that, up until now, had defiantly not been in Dean Bendis' vocabulary.


	16. Chapter 16

Jamie returned with her supplies and sat next to Dean on the bed. She asked him to sit up so Ty could strip off his blood splattered tee shirt and, when he lifted his arms, Jamie noticed for the first time that the cast on his left hand that had been keeping his boxer's fracture immobilized wasn't there anymore. "What happened to your cast?" she asked as Ty leaned in to grab the bottom of the shirt.

"Fucking thing itched," Dean said crossly then groaned in pain bringing his left arm in tight to his chest, his face going deathly pale.

"He probably doesn't feel any pain when he's amped," Jamie guessed correctly as the battered undercover cop fell back, content to wear the bloody shirt for the rest of his life.

Dean hadn't felt anything when he took the hammer to the cast but with the latest hits of coke leaving his system he was back in the land of torment and pain.

"I got a buddy, an EMT, owes me big time," Ty told Jamie, "I'll give him a call and see if he can help us out."

Jamie nodded in relief and began cutting the shirt away. Nursing him through detox was one thing but replacing casts and setting bones and maybe even stitching closed the gash above his eye was a little out of her wheelhouse. Wiping his face gently she didn't think the cut would need stitches, only a few butterfly bandages, and the rest of the damage to his face was primarily swelling which in time would reduce down to angry bruises.

She cleaned him up as best she could and, after the visit from Ty's friend, a visit that would allow them to call it even, Dean now lay freshly bathed, his hand and wrist bound in a new cast, resting, if not comfortably then securely, in a clavicle brace and sling. Sitting next to the bed Jamie watched him as he slept fitfully opening his eyes from time to time as if to see if she was still there. She didn't take comfort in his actions because she still wasn't sure he wouldn't bolt the first chance he got, sealing his fate in her eyes...and in her heart.

Watching him moan and shiver, she wiped his brow with cool water and wondered what in the hell she was doing. Instead of spending her time with Scott, someone she was sure loved her with no strings attached; she was nursing a man who had made it perfectly clear that he wanted no strings, nothing to tie him down or to hold him back, a man who said and did things she didn't like or even understand. With Scott she knew exactly where she stood. With Dean she stood in quicksand.

The chemistry on her part had been immediate and Dean seemed to be totally into the sex but she figure he held back at least ninety percent of everything that made him tick, giving only the ten percent that was pure lust. The rest of him was strictly off limits to her and, if Carter and Ty were honest with themselves, them, too. at least Ty Curtis had time and experience with Dean Bendis on his side and Carter Shaw would probably think that even sharing ten percent was too much.

Their commanding officer was just that, a leader with his own agenda and who barked out orders and expected them to be followed blindly without consideration of any fallout or consequences. And when he wasn't shouting at them he was aloof and distant and when she had first started working in his unit, frankly, he had intimidated the hell out of her. But in the subsequent weeks Jamie Allen had become more or less comfortable in her job as an LAPD undercover cop and more or less comfortable with her boss and at 1:30 AM she knew exactly where she could find him.

Carter Shaw looked up from his desk when he heard footfalls on the floor and sighed when he spotted Jamie coming directly at him, a stack of plastic jewel cases in her hands. She put them down on Ty's desk.

"Is it in there?" he asked and she nodded.

"Yeah, and it looks pretty bad taken by itself, without Dean's side of the story."

Carter only grunted and closed the cover to a file he had been perusing but not before Jamie caught a glimpse of the picture stapled to the inside left side. It was Dean Bendis' official file and, when she looked up, Carter stared at her hard waiting for her to say something about it so he could jump down her throat.

"The others are pretty unremarkable...unless you're into porn," she added lightly.

Shaw's eyes ratcheted down slightly as he became both cautious and curious about what the other DVDs held. He stood up and rounded his desk to reach for the stack.

Snatching up the topmost case Jamie smiled a tight little smile and said, "Nice ass, Carter."

"What?" he demanded testily his dark tone daring her to repeat herself.

She held up the plastic case and took his dare, "I said...nice ass, Carter."

Carter Shaw had a good idea what she was referring to and her comment only pissed him off more than he already was. He didn't have times for riddles or games and watched her through slitted eyes as she turned the DVD over in her hand and said, "Nice room at the Four Seasons, nice suit, nice green silk dress, really nice high heels, nice ass."

Smiling tightly Carter reached for the DVD again and this time she let him have it.

"Who all has seen this?" he asked evenly, stacking it back on the pile.

"Well, me of course...and Ty...and Dean, I think, only he gave it two thumbs down."

Carter looked sideways at her and, instead of smiling ruefully which is what he expected from her, she was staring at him thoughtfully.

"You gonna do something about it?" she then asked.

He knew exactly what she was getting at this time but he had no intention of contacting Erin Scott and not because he didn't want to. He thought about it almost every hour on the hour but it was his ex-wife who kept his fingers from dialing Denver. He didn't want to love someone again just to loose her in the end. "Nope," he said simply and firmly.

Jamie shoved her hands deep into the pockets of her leather jacket and watched him as his finger touched the top most jewel case, "That's too bad, Carter, because you really make a beautiful couple."

She was right. They had been a contrast in beauty. She, so pale in green silk and diamonds and him, so dark in blue Armani and gold. That hadn't been the only contrast as 'Sarah Miles' stood next to him in the reflection of the mirrored walls of the elevator of the hotel. He was a law enforcement officer and she, a mouthpiece for the St Louis mob. But even that had been an illusion, shattered when he'd found out she was DEA working toward the same end game, complicating his world even more.

Even before he knew she was one of the good guys Carter Shaw had connected with Erin Scott on levels he hadn't know existed and the temptation to call her, to pick up where they had left off in the hotel room, this time knowing that instead of having nothing in common they had everything, was enticing to say the least but Carter had almost fifteen years on her, fifteen years of collateral damage including a wrecked marriage, untold broken promises and years of putting his career before everything else...no matter whom he hurt along the way. And now he had nothing but the job and he had convinced himself that it was enough.

"Too bad," Jamie replied as she turned to go.

"For me or for you?" he asked and she froze.

Turning slowly she saw that he held one of the other DVDs in his hand, one of the many in the stack featuring Dean Bendis. He knew from the get go that she and Dean had been screwing each other and he was prepared to look the other way until it became a problem but right now all he wanted to do was to set Jamie straight. "If I make a play for her you think Dean will back off, right?"

"That sounds so junior high school," she said after hearing it said out loud and she was embarrassed that there was a grain of truth in what he said, albeit a very small one. "I don't care what Dean does," she vowed and if Carter hadn't been so good at his job he might have believed her.

"No, Jamie," he started, his face and tone deadly serious, "_I_ don't care what Dean does...or what Ty does or what you do on your own time. I do however care, maybe more than you'll ever know, about what goes down on my watch and if Bendis can't get his shit together and get it together fast, he's gone."


	17. Chapter 17

It was well passed three in the morning before Jamie returned to Dean's house and, exhausted, she lay down next to him on the bed.

"I thought maybe you went home to the boyfriend," said a quiet voice from out of the dark startling her.

"You okay? You need anything?" She asked turning to face him. She could make out his profile in the dim light thrown by the kitchen light.

"I'm good." he told her, "Ty took the brunt of it before he went home to Melissa. How about you? You take the brunt of Carter's nasty temper when he saw the tapes?"

"I didn't stick around," she said, "Maybe he didn't even watch 'em."

"Fat chance...like Carter lifting my suspension..._especially_ after he sees 'em."

"I told him that you needed to be there to explain what went down."

"And you think he's gonna believe me...any more than you do?"

Jamie sat up on the side of the bed and ran her hands through her honey colored hair. Looking up at the ceiling she took a deep breath. "Listen, Dean, it doesn't matter if I believe you or not. If Carter shows those to Maynard you're done. What you did...it just wasn't right."

"It was a righteous kill, Jamie..." he insisted again.

"That's not what I'm talking about. I'm not a prude..." Jamie started and she could imagine Dean's lascivious smile when she said it, "and sometimes kinky is good but...Christ, the look on that woman's face when you...took her..."

Dean's smile faded quickly and if she could have seen his face she might not have said anything else. "She knew what she signed on for when she took the job," Dean rationalized, anger edging his voice.

Jamie's stomach knotted. "Now you sound just like Carter," she pointed out to him.

"Then he'll understand," Dean said confidently but Jamie wasn't so sure.

Each of them had had a brief but interconnecting relationship with the same woman and things could end up in a testosterone fueled pissing match between the two of them if Carter changed his mind and decided to not let it go. But once his mind was made up Jamie found that Carter rarely changed it so the real problem would be if Dean didn't let it go...and did something stupid...like punching out a DEA unit chief. "Why'd you go back to the station? Why'd you risk everything?" she wanted to know.

Throwing his good arm over his eyes Dean told her cryptically, "I had to see her eyes."

"Why, so you could see the hate in them?"

"No...no hate. She was shocked at first, then angry and then I got my ass handed to me," he said with a chuckle.

She sighed in exasperation. "You don't even know this woman."

Dean grew sullen again and asked rhetorically, "What's the first thing you're taught to do when you find yourself in a hostage situation? You humanize yourself. Let the hostage taker get to know you. Be more than a piece of meat."

"And?" Jamie asked, on the one hand wanting him to continue, on the other hand not so much.

"And right about now I know more about Erin Scott than her own mother."

"So where do you fit into her hopes and dreams?" Jamie asked sarcastically,

Dean didn't rise to the bait because he didn't know if he did fit into her dreams...or if he even wanted to. "I donno. She has a life, a real good life in Denver, the kind of life anybody in his right mind would want to have."

"But you don't know if you could fit in, if you could keep the skeletons from popping out of you closet."

"That's you, babe. I got nothin' to hide."

What he said was true and it hurt. She had a whole past to hide from Scott and she didn't know exactly how to broach the subject with the man she thought she loved. "Then why don't you go for it? I'm sure she'll forgive and forget."

"You know, Allen, sometimes you can be a real bitch," he said but there was no real animosity in his voice. Dean would have to go some to convince himself that Erin Scott would, if not forget what had happened, at least forgive him because 'You fucking bastard!" was not an auspicious start to the healing process.

"I just don't want you to get hurt," Jamie said totally derailing his train of thought.

"No, no. It's all right. I kind of like that about you," he told her trying to turn toward her, grunting in pain then aborting the effort, "You gonna lie back down?"

She had been ready to leave but his gentle tone soothed her anger and the jealously that kept rearing it's ugly head whenever he spoke of Erin Scott. She thought that maybe he was seeing the light _and_ the woman who had been standing right in front of him...or lying right next to him in the dark the whole time. Jamie was confused by the mixed signals he was always sending out. Was his sexual interest in her more even as he insisted it wasn't? His job was to lie and he was good at it, even lying to himself. She was just as confused by her own feelings toward Scott. Was she mistaking affection and loyalty and dreams of a good life for true love or was she just settling because she didn't think she deserved anything better?

Lost in her thoughts Jamie felt his good hand as he took hers and brought it to rest atop the bulge in his jeans and, although he never lied to her, never mentioned love or that he even cared for her, she couldn't stop herself. She made love to him in the darkness as he lay on his back thinking of someone else the whole time.


	18. Chapter 18

Looking up Carter Shaw stared threateningly at Dean Bendis as he approached his desk. It was the first time the young undercover agent had been back to the compound in three weeks and Carter's bitch face only made him smile as he came forward, placed his good hand on the desk and asked forcefully, "We good?"

Carter smiled but cheer and goodwill were miles away from reaching his baby blues and, leaning back in his chair, he answered tersely, "No Dean, we're pretty fucking far from good."

Without letting his smile slip Dean wanted to know, "Okay then, how do I make it good? Piss in a cup? I'm ready. Undergo an FFD? When do I start?"

"I know you're clean and I also know you're Mensa material. It's your T-score on the PD that might be a problem. Right now I'm guessin' you'll come up 'Unfit for duty and not likely to become fit in the foreseeable future with or without psychological treatment'," Carter repeated from memory and added, "So no, no FFD."

Dean's smile faded and became a sneer. Carter Shaw was not the first person to question hiss state of mind or his psychological well-being. That had started when he was a child andn his high priced shrink had asked him if his father had ever touched him inappropriately. The eleven year old had simply stared down the doctor until the man had become so uncomfortable that he quit seeing his young patient. Dean Bendis' father had done no such thing and the mere suggestion of it had enraged the boy because his father was cold and uncaring and always busy or gone and never touched him in anger or with love.

As he grew Dean held it all in during his subsequent sessions with subsequent shrinks and let it all out at school or at home until his parents, seeing no change in their youngest son's attitude or behavior, deemed him incorrigible and stopped seeking a psychological answer to their prayers. Seven high dollar prep and military schools and one bought and paid for college degree later and Dean Bendis was finally his own man.

After a couple of years of dealing drugs and running numbers he found himself standing at a crossroads with Carter Shaw's gun pointed directly into his face. Carter gave him a choice and he'd given up his short but lucrative life of crime and, after finishing first in his class at the academy and with no one in the audience to see him receive his diploma, he left the comfortable and affluent lifestyle to which he had been born and disappeared into the Dark Blue yonder.

Dean Bendis again stood at a crossroad, his future hanging by a thread and entirely in the hands of Carter Shaw. "Sit down," Carter snapped and when Dean balked he shouted, "Sit down!"

Dean grudgingly did as he was told, his jaw grinding, his eyes bright with fury but he kept his mouth shut as Carter opened his desk drawer and pulled out the stack of DVDs. He slammed them onto the desktop smashing the lower most jewel case and remained silent, a trick he'd learned long ago. His icy stare and stoic silence unnerving most people to the point that all they wanted to do was fill in the awkward silence usually with something incriminating. But Dean was the master of the thousand-yard stare and the two of them sat in virtual silence, the traffic outside the building the only sound as the night shift began until Dean finally spoke up.

"Did you watch 'em?" he asked pointing to the stack.

Carter leaned forward and to Dean's surprise asked, "Do I need to?"

Letting his breath out slowly Dean was relieved and thankful that Carter still trusted him enough to take him at his word, that what he had done had been in the line of duty, albeit a thin and fluid line, undulating and ever changing within Deep Cover. "No," Dean answered firmly. He reached for the DVDs and Carter clamped his hand down on top of his.

"Destroy these...before they destroy you," he ground out and watched as Dean picked up the incriminating discs and shove them into the sling that still cradled his left arm. Sitting back in his seat Carter turned to the sound of laughter as Ty and Jamie walked into the room, Jamie's smile dying away as soon as she saw who sat in front of the boss's desk.

"Your suspension been lifted, man?" Ty wanted to know, his smile fading, too, when neither man spoke.

"Has it, Carter?" Dean asked him point blank.

The unit leader opened his deck drawer and, pulling out a dossier, tossed it down on the desk in front of the three of them. Relief flooded through Jamie as she made herself comfortable sitting on the corner of Carter's desk while Dean and Ty took the two vacant chairs in front and he began to speak. "This is Demyan, the Russian form of the Greek name Damian, meaning to tame or to subdue and, euphemistically, to kill. He works as an assassin for the Russian mob and when he can't tame or subdue he simply kills. His latest victim is Roland West of WestCo Shipping, LLC..." and it was back to business as usual.

A month later Demyan was behind bars as were a number of his comrades and, gearing up for another bust, Carter waited patiently for his team to troop in. Jamie Allen was first bringing him coffee with which he surreptitiously washed down his pain killers. Ty Curtis was next, refreshed and all smiles after spending the afternoon in bed with his gorgeous wife. And Dean Bendis? He never showed or answered his cell or came to his door and, thoroughly pissed off, Carter Shaw forgot all about his ex-wife and his promise to himself and placed a phone call to an unlisted number in Denver, Colorado.


	19. Chapter 19

The DEA knew exactly when Dean Bendis hit Denver but they couldn't keep track of him, especially when he headed directly to the last place they would have ever thought to look for him, DEA headquarters. Once there he found out exactly where Erin Scott was supposed to be and he charged recklessly ahead.

"You can't go in there!"

Dean simply ignored the receptionist and opened the door marked Dr. Barrows and walked into the room.

"Ah, Dean Bendis, I presume," said Dr. Amanda Burrows, the department psychologist.

A mature woman in her forties, with short brown hair and green eyes, she was still a knockout but, after giving her a cursory glance, Dean's gaze turned immediately to Erin Scott. She looked different to him, a little softer, her face a little fuller and her breasts, so full and lush even camouflaged by her regulation business attire.

As he stood before her and stared, he found that his wanting of her hadn't cooled at all in the weeks following the bust and that his yearning began to manifest itself in the hardening of his dick and the darkening of his eyes. Redirecting his thoughts, and his eyes, Dean then noticed the dark circles rimming Erin's eyes as she watched him from her place on the couch, legs crossed, hands fisted in her lap, on guard against him. She was only missing a silver cross with which to ward him off, he thought ruefully, and turned his attention back to the doctor. "I apologize for the intrusion,"he said tersely then turned his attention back to Erin.

The DEA agent looked at him and listened as he said, "I thought maybe I could tell the doc here what went down, maybe help you out."

Erin snorted derisively. Dean Bendis had helped her quite enough already, thank you. Helped her to doubt her abilities as well as her sanity while leading her, at one time, unswervingly toward an early grave. Even now he may have unwittingly helped her right out of the job she loved.

Noticing his position, close to agent Scott, and his stance, definitely aggressive, Dr. Burrows suggested that he sit in one of the chairs off to the side of the couch. Dean glanced dismissively at her and took a seat right next to Erin on the couch. "Okay then," Dr. Burrows said and wrote down the name 'Carter Shaw' and next to that, 'Dean Bendis' on the tablet she held in her lap. Under Dean's name she denoted 'no respect for authority' 'combative', character flaws that she could handle but which could cause her original subject undue concern and stress. But Erin Scott seemed to take it in stride, almost as if she expected that kind of behavior from the man who sat so comfortably next to her and she simply turned to stare into his eyes, a blush coloring her cheeks as their gazes locked.

Finished writing for the moment, the doctor took her glasses from her nose and stared at Dean in silence as she sized him up. Her expression remained passive as she neither accepted what she saw at face value nor rejected him out of hand, his uneasy countenance and defensive demeanor classic for undercover cops, none of whom ever wanted to end up in her office. "So Agent Scott tells me you were instrumental in saving her life," Dr. Burrows began and Dean's eyes opened perceptibly and his eyebrows lifted.

Someone finally got it and Dean was surprised as hell that it had been Erin Scott. "I just did what I had to do," he told the doctor in a calm voice even as he waited for the other shoe to fall. And fall it did.

"Be that as it may, I want you to know that I recommended that Agent Scott file assault charges against you?"

Dean turned to Erin and suddenly desperate to make it right he whispered, "Do what you gotta do."

"It's all right," Erin said to them both, "I get it."

"Well, I don't," Burrows said then asked, "You felt that raping agent Scott in front of two other men would keep you both alive?"

Dean didn't answer for some time. He turned to search Erin's face but she had turned her head away to stare straight ahead, her eyes on the picture behind the doctor's head while Dr. Burrows continued to write...only faster now. "When the shit hit the fan I had to take charge of the situation. Establish who the Alpha was. I had to stake my claim to agent Scott as only a man can and as only another man can understand. I let Clovis and Fiore know agent Scott was mine, strictly off limits."

"Mr. Fiore apparently didn't get the message."

"He did…eventually," Dean said without emotion as if beating a man nearly to death was par for the course.

"You don't think your actions regarding Mr. Fiore were overly brutal?"

"Brutality was one of the only things the fat fuck understood," Dean said vehemently, his eyes going cold.

Dr. Burrows' eyebrow lifted and she continued to press him, "And with agent Scott? Was brutality the only option in dealing with her?"

Dean sighed and turned to Erin who wondered how much rope Dean was going to take from Burrows before she hung him...out to dry.

"From the first moment I saw her in Clovis' office, going head to head with my boss; I knew she was intelligent and pretty much fearless. Then, when I found out she was working undercover for DEA, I knew she was much more than that. I knew she was a highly trained officer of the law and duty bound to bring Clovis, Fiore and me in at all costs and, barring that, to escape once her cover had been blown. She would have taken me to the wall if I had let her get the upper hand."

"So to stop her from taking you to the wall you smacked her around and took her to the bed as it were."

Color suffused Dean's face and when he turned his eyes back to the shrink she began writing again in her pad, stopping only when he tried to explain.

"I couldn't risk telling her who I was so I spoke to her in the only other way I could without blowing my cover, too."

"Through the language of love?" Dr. Burrows said sarcastically with a laugh she couldn't quite hold back.

Dean remembered why he hated shrinks so much but kept his anger in check as he tried to explain to a civilian, no less, what he had done and why. "Sex is a language as old as time and, depending on how it's spoken, it can convey love and passion or power and control. I had to show all of them who was in charge, who ultimately held the power."

"Even…" Dr. Burrows began.

He cut her off. "Especially Agent Scott," he said hotly as if the woman should have known, "For all intents and purposes Erin knew she was dead. She had nothing to loose by going up against me and I knew she would try to beat me at any cost, even by denying me her own life."

Erin felt the scars on her palm tingle and opening her hand she remembered the shard of glass slicing painfully into her skin and the despair that had driven her to that point.

"So, you felt that by brutalizing her…"

Dean shot a challenging look toward the doctor and more than willing to add a second or even a third chapter to the book she was evidently writing about him said, "When I fucked her I 'spoke' to her, let her know who held the power over life and death." He knew the doctor was about to lay some kind of psycho-bullshit on him but he cut her off to finish. "And at other times I 'spoke' to her of hope, compassion...even love."

Erin's eyes widened and she knew that Dean Bendis was mad, completely, utterly, fucking insane. Love! She almost spat the word out but kept her silence and, when she turned to look at him, he was staring directly at her in that soul-searching way of his. She held his gaze and although she had tried hard to forget everything she did remember the gentle kiss on her palm, the massaging of her aching muscles, the many normal, civilized things he had done to her and for her. Things that she was convinced at the time he had done to keep her off balance, to drive her over the edge.

To be fair she thought back to the days he had held her captive and, while forcing her deeper and deeper into despair, he had always offered her a small lifeline even as he brutally attacked her again and again and a single tear rolled down her cheek.

But Dr. Burrows hadn't been there, hadn't lived through it, and she cleared her throat almost as a warning when she saw agent Scott's reaction. "And you don't think any of your actions were out of line, Sergeant Bendis?" she asked lowering her glasses and looking hard at the man sitting in front of her.

"Absolutely some were," Dean said unabashedly. "I realize now that I was way out of line, had been for weeks living the life of a killer. Toward the end I had trouble separating the men, the jobs and with agent Scott being thrown into my lap, well, that complicated things even more and…" Dean inhaled deeply and after a few beats of his heart admitted, "And I wanted her, plain and simple. I couldn't get enough of her and once I set the ground rules and made that first move there was no going back for me...or for her." Dean rubbed his palm over his close-cropped hair and then massaged the knuckles of his once broken fist, a twinge of pain in hise knuckles.

Dr. Burrows made note of it all before asking a few final questions. "If you had met Erin Scott in another time, in another place would you have pursued her and would you have taken no for an answer?"

"She's a beautiful woman and, yes, I would have pursued her but I would have taken no for an answer," he answered truthfully then brought things back to the here and now, "But I didn't meet Erin Scott in another time or place. I met her deep undercover in Mike Killeen's world, in the belly of the beast and 'No' was not an option...for either of us."

"And if she tells you no today?"

"I'm on the first plane back to LA."

The good doctor wrote one more note on her pad then said to them both, "I think this wraps things up, Agent Scott, Sergeant Bendis."

Dean stood and offered his hand to Erin and, never hesitating, she just took it as he helped her up. He placed his hand familiarly on the small of her back and ushered her toward the door and with his hand on the knob he turned back to Dr. Burrows and said, "You weren't surprise to see me."

"Lieutenant Shaw told me you'd be coming," Burrows said with a tight smile and closed her notebook with finality.


	20. Chapter 20

Once outside of Burrows' office Erin turned to face Dean. "What are you doing here, Sergeant Bendis?"

Pursing his lips Dean breathed in through his nose and sighed out with puffed cheeks. "I don't know."

"Fucking cowboys," she said under her breath as she turned and started to walk away.

Dean grabbed her gently by the elbow. "Don't go...please."

Erin stopped, turned back to him and suggested, "Go home, Sergeant Bendis."

Tilting his head he looking at her and tried to explain, "I came here because I want you to know me."

"Oh, I think I know you all right" she assured him and took a step away from him. His eyes clouded with pain and confusion and it caught her off guard. After a few moments of his silence Erin reconsidered and thought that a cup of coffee couldn't hurt...unless he tried something and then she would simply shoot his ass. "There's a coffee shop over on fourteenth," she suggested and, when he raised his eyebrows and his hopes, she added, "No candy ass Starbucks either. This place has genuine cop coffee. Thick as pudding and it'll keep you up for days."

The coffee shop was just as she said...no Starbucks. The coffee was scalding hot and black as midnight and they sat opposite each other in a small vinyl seated booth, Erin was comfortable on her turf while Dean fidgeted nervously for once. "So you were just in the neighborhood, huh?" she said and he smiled sheepishly.

"No, actually. I guess I'm officially AWOL," he said burning his tongue on his drink, "You didn't seem too surprised to see me either. Did Carter call you, too?"

"I haven't spoken to Lieutenant Shaw since the day McLeod jacked you up."

"I had a broken clavicle," Dean said in his own defense but knew he had taken the brunt of the beating simply because he thought he deserved it.

"Mac was Golden Gloves and he boxed for Uncle Sam in the Navy," Erin told him.

Dean wasn't interested in anything she had to say about her unit chief...except when she told him that he'd broken the man's nose. "So who did Carter call?"

"Your sparring partner," she told him, "Mac called Burrows to let her know you were on your way up and she practically started salivating."

"Yeah, it's not every day a UC willingly walks into the spider's parlor." Dean reached for his cup again but thought better of drinking any more of the molten lava until it had time to cool down.

"She's been having a field day with me," Erin admitted thoroughly exhausted by the whole process. The good doctor had pushed hard for her to bring Dean Bendis up on charges but Erin had refused. She really did get what he had done. His plan had been unconventional, to say the least, but it had kept her alive and out of the hands of the odious Carlo Fiore and, as his defense council would have more than likely brought up after a while, she had become a willing participant.

"Will she stamp you FFD?"

"She already has. Today was just another exit interview." Dean's brows furrowed and she explained "another", "I'm headed to Quantico and, for all intents and purposes, a desk job."

"Is that what you want?'

"I'm okay with it, I guess," Erin said shrugging her shoulder, "I'll manage."

"Listen, I'm sorry if I had anything to do with your transfer," Dean said placing his hand on hers.

Erin looked him in the eyes but didn't pull her hands away. She smiled reflectively, almost as if he did have something to do with it, "It's all good, Sergeant," she assured him then said, "So you came to tell me all your deep, dark secrets."

"I'll tell you everything...after I show you something," he promised, "But it's personal and needs to be in private."

His words were so sincere, his eyes so open and honest, that Erin threw caution to the wind and they left the coffee shop and walked the two blocks to her home just as a light, late fall, snow started to fall.

"Acme lofts," Dean said craning his neck to look up at the imposing sign high up on the huge five story brick building, "I keep expecting to see a safe swinging by a rope and Wiley Coyote standing on the sidewalk."

"It started out as the Brecht Chocolate and Candies building in 1902 then became Acme Upholstery Company until some real estate developers converted it in '92," she told him as she turned the key to her door and they walked inside, "I bought this unit ten years ago." Her loft was both spacious and cozy at the same time, with the original wide plank flooring, huge oak beams, a working fireplace and red brick walls with exposed electrical fittings.

The unit's plumbing ran in a maze high up on the ceiling and Dean saw a faint resemblance to Carter's compound, only cleaner and tastefully decorated with plush couches and expensive antiques. It also had a complete kitchen and not just a microwave and grotty refrigerator filled with fruit cups and, instead of having to rack out on a ratty leather couch, there was a huge four poster bed butted up against one of the brick walls.

"DEA must pay a hell of a lot better than LAPD," Dean said and noticed the three black suitcases packed and standing at attention next to the door, "I didn't realize you were leaving so soon."

"Oh eight hundred," she told him and he winced. Shucking off her coat Erin watched as Dean took off his jacket and, laying it on the back of the couch, he walked to the windows and watched the rapidly falling tiny crystalline flakes in the fading light.

"Not much of a view," he remarked knowing that up on the fifth floor the view of the Rockies would have been spectacular.

"I know," she agreed, "But I have my own patio and it dumps right out onto the bike path."

Dean had seen the bicycle hanging from hooks just inside the kitchen door while checking for an alternate escape route, a long-standing protocol that was hard to ignore. Wandering past a couple of pricey pieces of art anchored to the brick walls he stopped and stooped down in front of the fireplace. Turning he asked, "You mind if I light this?"

When she nodded he laid match to paper and the kindling quickly caught sending golden flames up to lick at the larger logs on the grate. They, too, began to smolder and finally catch. "It's snowing harder," he remarked.

Erin turned to the bank of industrial sized windows and measured the flakes. "Big flakes, little snow, little flakes, big snow," she told him, "I think we'll both be able to fly out in the morning."

Dean noticed that Erin still stood as if waiting to be invited fully into her own home and the thought distressed him. She was still uncomfortable just being around him but seemed to be willing to take a chance...as long as she had her gun under her suit jacket.

After a few quiet moments she finally said to him, "What is it that you wanted to show me, Sergeant Bendis?"

Dean crossed over to her and, to her credit, she stood her ground. She didn't back away when he lifted both hands and cupped her face and whispered, "That you can call me Dean." His lips brushed hers lightly and, although hers remained unmoving, she didn't recoil at his touch and he kissed her again, this time with more pressure, willing her to respond instead of leaving him twisting in the wind.

Erin felt the tenderness in his kiss, saw the total surrender as he closed his eyes, something he never did when he kissed her as Michael Killeen, and her mind and her body both betrayed her. She kissed him back just as tenderly and Dean almost went down to his knees.

Pulling away he smoothed her slightly mussed hair and looked into her eyes. Erin never said a word, or broke eye contact, just pulled the Sig Sauer P266 and holster from her waistband and placed them on the sofa table.

Following suit, Dean placed his stainless Kimber Pro Raptor II on the table next to her weapon and, scooping her up in his arms, took her to the bedroom and laid her down in the center of the king sized bed. They were surrounded by four, black ornate wrought iron posts and roofed with a heavy ivory lace canopy. Kneeling next to her he slipped off her high heels and her suit jacket and unbuttoned and removed her white silk blouse. Unzipping her skirt he slid it down over her hips and she lay before him clothed only in virginal white lacy bra and panties and a garter belt with tiny red roses running the length of the support straps that held up her dark, 100% silk, French stockings.

She was even more beautiful than he remembered, especially without the dark, ugly bruises. The planes of her stomach and her breasts were still firm but gently rounded. Dean opened the clasp to her bra and her breasts tumbled out and suddenly self conscious under his passionate gaze Erin brought up her hands to cover her taught nipples. But he wouldn't let her hide anything from him the same way he wouldn't keep any secrets from her, once he showed her.

Gently pulling her right hand away he turned it palm up and gently straightened her fingers. The scars across her hand were faintly pink and soon would be faded almost away and, as he leaned in to place a kiss in her palm, his erection trying desperately to break free of his slacks, the fleeting fact that her love line had been completely severed by scar tissue crossed his mind. The thought was quickly forgotten when she moaned. Slowly removing the rest of her garments Dean stepped back and shed his own clothes and returned to the bed to kneel next to her.

Erin opened her mouth to speak but he covered her lips with his and kissed her until she had no breath with which to speak nor any coherent thoughts to voice and she was content to just lay back and let him show her. His lips moved from her mouth, down her throat to her breasts and, after suckling like a greedy infant, they trailed further down where her taste was so familiar and she came again and again as he assaulted her with his practiced and welcomed tongue.

Rising up over her to stare again into her eyes, Dean saw they were dark and soft and sleepily sated and guiding himself into her slick and yielding depths he made love to her slowly and gently and when he finally came, her musky fragrance and flavor pungent in his nose and on his tongue, Dean Bendis forgot all about Carter Shaw and Jamie Allen and just let himself be.


	21. Chapter 21

Carter Shaw sat in his police issue Dodge Challenger, his phone to his ear and, after sweeping the vehicle for the umpteenth time, he was sure that it was the only place he wouldn't be overheard or his call intercepted. Holding up his end of the conversation with a grunt every now and then he listened as Dr Burrows spoke.

"Sergeant Bendis definitely displays some anti-social behavior as well as a few sociopathic tendencies but nothing to be overly concerned about. He'll never make a good patrol officer and should probably think twice about becoming a father but his character flaws are an asset in his work as an undercover cop."

"And the situation with Erin?"

"Sergeant Bendis explained everything to my satisfaction," Burrows said simply then added, "And to hers."

Carter remained silent for a long time, not even a grunt, and Dr. Burrows finally asked if he was still on the line. When he told her he was, she asked him, "Do you have a problem with his version of the story?"

Carter had never really heard Dean's side of the story. He had never watched the tapes except for the one marked Avery Smith which he had kept. He had however read Erin Scott's official report before Maynard made it disappear per his request. He had also heard a few tidbits dropped by Ty and Jamie and had seen first hand the scratches on Dean's face, the cast on his hand and the way Erin Scott and her partners had reacted to seeing him at the station. He could pretty well guess what had gone on. "I just wanna know one thing. Does he know right from wrong?"

It was Dr. Burrows' turn to be surprised but she answered truthfully, "Yes, he does. Even though his world is, and has always been, primarily made up of shades of gray, Sergeant Bendis has a profound sense of right and wrong."

Good, Carter thought, then I'll know it's his choice when he finally flips to the dark side. Carter cleared his throat and said, "Thank you for taking an unofficial look at my guy, Doctor Burrows."

"I was happy to help. As you know Erin Scott is a valued resource to DEA and our loss is Quantico's gain," she said. Carter was quiet once again and, to fill in the awkward silence, Dr. Burrows added, "Mac must have told you that she's been transferred to Hostage Negotiations as a trainer."

McLeod had only grudgingly taken Carter's phone call telling him of Dean's impending arrival but he may have intimated to Dr. Burrows that the two of them were much more than just two cops who had passed in the night on the Clovis bust. She believed that he had, in fact, once been an integral part of the very unit to which McLeod and Erin Scott belonged. "He never mentioned a thing about it. That's gotta be a tough break for him...and I bet Lassie's fit to be tied," Carter said smoothly and added, "Talk about being out of the 'for old time sake' loop."

Burrows laughed and assured him, "Well, I'm sure she'll call you herself to fill you in herself and when she does, tell her that the office pool's sixty-forty that it'll be a boy."

Erin sat on the corner of the bed and just watched as Dean slept. His face was completely relaxed, the furrows between his eyes absolutely smooth, his dark whiskers shadowing his chin and she wondered how often he was able to "sleep like a baby" as he was at that moment. The thought of a sleeping baby with his features crossed her mind and she stood up and quietly walked into the bathroom. Bending over the wastebasket she pulled one of the used condoms from its shallow depth and, sealing it in a plastic container, she dropped it into an evidence bag which she then tucked away into her purse. She returned to sit again on the edge of the bed, content to just watch him as he slept.

During the night he had told her. About his childhood, about his foray into a life of crime, about his life altering meeting with Carter Shaw, about his hopes and dreams. During the night he had shown her. That he was decent and forthright, complicated and tender and capable of giving, unconditionally, the love that had been withheld from him. He had also shown her that he could be trusted, trusted to never hurt her again and, as she sat watching him, she wondered if she could also trust him to walk out of her life when she said finally said no.

Dean walked into the compound the following night thankful that Carter was alone. "Listen Carter," he started but Shaw didn't even bother to look up from the file he was reading. After a moment to judge just how pissed off his Lieutenant was, Dean forged on, "I'm sorry but I needed to take care of something, something personal."

Carter looked up at him and after a measured look and a measured amount of time said, "I spoke to Dr. Burrows and she says you know the difference between right and wrong."

Dean was stunned. The psychic son of a bitch had set him up, called Denver and the spider had been waiting for him. But Carter Shaw had no otherworldly powers, just the uncanny ability to read Dean Bendis like a book. "Yeah, I do Carter," the young UC answered cautiously but really wanted to know, "What's this all about?"

"It's about being responsible, about using protection when you fuck somebody, about doing the right thing," Carter went on cryptically.

Yeah, he had used condoms but he hadn't fucked Erin. He'd made glorious love to her. But seeing the look of contempt on Carter's face Dean realized that he wasn't talking about Denver. He was talking about LA.

"You didn't use protection when you raped Erin Scott," Carter said getting to his feet and rounding the desk, "and now she's pregnant." Carter's voice dripped venom as he ground out his accusation.

Dean looked at him as if he was the world's biggest asshole. "Since when does a dead woman need protection from pregnancy or aids or anything else? Those scumbags expected me to kill her, not worry about knocking her up and living happily ever after."

"Yeah, but that's exactly what happened...although I don't think happily ever after has ever been part of your plans...for any woman."

"And you're positive this baby's mine," Dean shot back with a sneer and added self-righteously, "You rode her bareback, too, pal." and that was when Carter slugged him.

The subsequent knock down drag out, one that had been coming for a long time, didn't hurt nearly as much as the realization that Erin hadn't told him that she was pregnant. Knowing he could be the father of her unborn child, she had still said no and he had no choice but to let her go.

It was spring again and Erin sat enjoying the warmth of the sun as she at a small metal table in her tiny courtyard while waiting for Davis Colley and his wife to take her to the hospital. Although the results of Dean Bendis' DNA sample and that of her baby had come back months ago, she hadn't spoken to him since she'd said no and he'd walked out of her life. She now felt it only right to call the father to be and, putting her phone to her ear, she dialed an unlisted number.

"Where's Carter?" Dean asked trotting up to Ty and Jamie as they stood by Carter's desk, "I set up a meet in half an hour with that jackoff, Travis Dunne. We gotta book."

Ty looked uncomfortable and Jamie turned her eyes to the floor, suddenly fascinated by the cockroach that was making its way toward the kitchen.

"Yo, where's Carter? Travis' contact ain't gonna wait," Dean said anxiously.

Clearing his throat Ty told him, "Carter's not here. We're gonna have to do this without him."

Jamie finally looked up and, glancing guiltily at him, picked up her jacket from the desktop. "Carter laid it all out. Make the buy, pop the contact and sweat him for a couple of days until he flips his source."

Dean stepped back and tilting his head, stared at them both. "Where...the fuck...is Carter?"

Jamie looked away again and when Dean made an angry move toward her Ty physically cut him off. "Carter ain't here, man," Ty repeated. He pushed Dean back and, knowing that his partner would not let it be, told him with a sigh, "He's gone to Denver."

"Denver?" Dean said, his heart starting to race, his face going pale.

Ty picked up the keys to Carter's Challenger and stuffed them into his jacket pocket then added, "He's flyin' out right about now...tryin' to get there in time for the birth of his son."

FIN

Thanks so much to all of you who have stopped by to read and to review. This is a wonderful place to practice my craft, witch and literary. I have a Carter centric Dark Blue fic waiting in the wings but first I need to get back to another Dean and his brother Sam and help them stop the Apocalypse. Again, much thanks!


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